''Heir Hunters'' is a BBC television programme focusing on attempts to find missing or unknown heirs, entitled to deceased people's estates before the

British Treasury His Majesty's Treasury (HM Treasury), occasionally referred to as the Exchequer, or more informally the Treasury, is a department of His Majesty's Government responsible for developing and executing the government's public finance policy and e ...

lawfully collects the money. The show follows the work of probate researchers from a number of different firms to show how the results of time-consuming research turned out. The main firms followed have been Fraser and Fraser, Celtic Research and Finders International. It was announced in 2011 that ''Heir Hunters'' would run in both

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daytime and in primetime television on

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that autumn. The eleventh series was aired on BBC One from 27 February 2017.

Description

The series is made by Flame TV, which is part of the Avalon Group. The first series was presented by Nadia Sawalha, while all subsequent series are narrated by Lisa Faulkner up to series 11. Series 12 is presented by Michael Buerk. The programme combined the worlds of legal probate genealogy and family history for the first time attracting audiences of over 1.2 million. The series was devised and developed by Jezz Wright for Irish Production company MINT TV after a meeting with Hector Birchwood from Celtic Research who features in the series. BBC Daytime executive Richard Thomson commissioned the first series to run alongside ITV's Trisha which had moved to Channel 5. MINT TV opted for a co-production with FLAME TV for the first series. The series runs as part of

's weekday lineup in the early morning factual slot (9:15 am – 10:00 am), alongside shows including ''Animal 24:7'' and '' Helicopter Heroes''. The second series had record viewing numbers for the time slot and beat ''

The Jeremy Kyle Show ''The Jeremy Kyle Show'' is a British tabloid talk show presented by Jeremy Kyle and produced by ITV Studios. It premiered on the ITV network on 4 July 2005, and ran for seventeen series until its cancellation on 10 May 2019. It was the most ...

'' on ITV consistently during its run, prompting the BBC to immediately recommission repeatedly series after series with series 11 being filmed in the autumn of 2016. The title cards for the 2008 and later series spell 'Heir Hunters' as 'H£ir Hunt£rs', using the pound sterling sign as a capital E. In each programme of the first two series three unclaimed estates from Bona Vacantia are mentioned in the hope of information being given by a viewer which could help find an heir or heirs. One of these mentioned in the first series resulted in information that led to some heirs being found for an estate. The term "Heir Hunter" has become known to refer to any person or firm who tracks down beneficiaries to estates of deceased persons. "Heir hunters" may also be known as probate genealogists, probate researchers, heir searchers, or forensic genealogists although the latter is mainly an American term for the industry. Heir Hunters are unregulated in the UK although STEP (the Society of Trust and Estate Practitioners) have endorsed their use. The series has been repeated on the A+E Networks UK channels

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and Bio. and UKTV channels

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and Yesterday. In 2011, it began to be transmitted on the

History Channel History (formerly The History Channel from January 1, 1995 to February 15, 2008, stylized as HISTORY) is an American pay television network and flagship channel owned by A&E Networks, a joint venture between Hearst Communications and the Dis ...

in the UK, New Zealand and Australia. Despite being syndicated around the world the participants only received a nominal £1.00 in return for signing a standard Flame TV/reality television waiver. From 21 November – 2 December 2011, ten re-versioned episodes of series 5 were shown on BBC Two at 7pm each weekday. The expanded episodes have an increased duration of 59 minutes and feature Lisa Faulkner on camera for the first time interviewing experts and Heir Hunters. BBC Two had ordered 20 episodes in total the 2nd set of 10 were from series 6 and were aired in January 2013.

Transmissions

The series was aired in a stripped daily format, running Monday – Friday for 3, 4, 5 and 4 weeks respectively. Series 10 was set to be re-edited into repeated 30-minute versions later in 2016 whilst filming for series 11 got underway. Series 11 began screening in 2017 and filming for Series 12 began in June 2017.

References

External links

The latest episodes detailed by the BBC and available to buy
Lynn Sharpe
Guest blog: my experience with the heir hunters 11 May 2012 * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Heir Hunters 2007 British television series debuts 2010s British television series BBC Television shows British non-fiction television series

Description

Transmissions

See also

References

External links