How to Serve the Notification by Trustee (Probate Code 16061.7)

Within 60 days after the settlor's death, the trustee must mail a written notice to every beneficiary and every heir (Probate Code § 16061.7). The letter must contain five items and a separate boldface warning in the statute's exact words. Done right, it gives each person served 120 days to contest the trust (Probate Code § 16061.8). Done wrong, the clock never starts, and a trustee who skipped someone is personally exposed (Probate Code § 16061.9).

Here's the thing. Probate Code § 16061.7 is an afternoon's work that decides whether a contest is still possible three years from now. If you googled 120 day notice trust California, this is the letter that starts that clock. Many family trustees in Santa Clara County skip it, send it late, or send a letter a sibling's lawyer will pick apart.

Who must receive the notification by trustee in California?

Three groups (Probate Code § 16061.7): each beneficiary of the trust, or of the part that became irrevocable; each heir of the settlor who died; and, for a charitable trust under its supervision, the Attorney General.

An heir is anyone who would inherit with no trust and no will at all (Probate Code § 44): for most Silicon Valley families the spouse and children, then parents, then siblings (Probate Code §§ 6401, 6402). The statute says "Each heir of the deceased settlor," so the daughter your father wrote out in 2021 gets the letter.

Skipping the disinherited child is the most common notice mistake. The statute sends the 120-day warning to each heir, which assumes an heir can contest, and an heir never served has no clock running (Probate Code §§ 16061.7, 16061.8). You may make "a good faith determination by any reasonable means" of who the heirs are (Probate Code § 16061.7); write down how you did it.

Two more rules. Since January 1, 2026, notice to someone who can represent and bind a beneficiary, such as a parent for a minor child or a conservator, "has the same effect as if notice were given directly to that represented person", absent a conflict of interest (Probate Code § 15804, rewritten by AB 565). And a trustee "is not liable to any person for serving or for not serving the notice" on extra people (Probate Code § 16061.7). When in doubt, serve.

What must the 16061.7 notice say, word for word?

Searching for a notification by trustee California form? The statute gives you a list, not a form. Every statutory notification by trustee must state five things (Probate Code § 16061.7):

When the trigger is a death, the letter must also carry a warning, "set out in a separate paragraph in not less than 10-point boldface type, or a reasonable equivalent thereof," in these exact words (Probate Code § 16061.7):

You may not bring an action to contest the trust more than 120 days from the date this notification by the trustee is served upon you or 60 days from the date on which a copy of the terms of the trust is delivered to you during that 120-day period, whichever is later.

Do not paraphrase it or shrink it. In Harustak v. Wilkins the warning sat in its own paragraph but in the same plain 12-point type as the letter: "Because the entire document was printed in the same 12-point type, we agree with appellants and reverse." A contest filed 147 days after the mailing was on time; the 120 days had never started.

Enclose the trust and every amendment; the reason is below. And a settlor's waiver of this notice "is against public policy and shall be void" (Probate Code § 16061.7), whatever the trust says.

How do you serve the notification by trustee?

Serve it by a method in Probate Code § 1215 to each person's last known address (Probate Code § 16061.7): for a family trustee, first-class mail in a sealed envelope with postage paid, to the person's home or business. Certified counts as first-class; plain first-class is enough.

The mailing date is the date that matters. "Delivery by mail is complete when the notice or other paper is deposited in the mail" (Probate Code § 1215). The 120 days run from the mailing date, not the day the envelope was opened, with no extra mailing days (Bridgeman v. Allen, where a petition filed 133 days after mailing was too late).

Do not rely on email. Electronic delivery counts only where the recipient has "expressly consented on the appropriate Judicial Council form" (Probate Code § 1215). A brother who emails back that he got it has not been served.

A Santa Clara County family trustee usually has heirs in three states. Mail them all the same day, then sign a proof of service: a one-page declaration listing every name and address, what was enclosed, and the mailing date. Keep it with the trust records. When a contest lands in the probate court in San Jose, it is the first thing anyone asks for.

When must the trustee serve the notice, and what if it is late?

The deadline in Probate Code § 16061.7 is 60 days after the event: the death that made the trust irrevocable, or the change of trustee. Learn of a beneficiary or heir later, and you have 60 days from that day. If the trustee's seat was empty when the event happened, your 60 days start when you begin serving (Probate Code § 16061.7).

Reading this on day 90? Send it today. Since 2023 the statute has said the clock runs "whether the notice is served on the person within or after the time period" for the trustee's own deadline (Probate Code § 16061.8). A late notice still works.

What it does not fix is your exposure. A trustee who fails to serve a beneficiary "shall be responsible for all damages, attorney’s fees, and costs caused by the failure" unless the trustee made a reasonably diligent effort (Probate Code § 16061.9). The court will not ask whether you meant well. It will ask what you mailed, to whom, and when. If a beneficiary is already threatening to sue over it, read what to do when a beneficiary threatens to sue.

Never serving is the worst case. Probate Code § 16061.8 binds only "A person upon whom the notification by the trustee is served," so against a person never served the 120-day rule has not started, and no published California appellate decision says what deadline applies instead; expect the other side to argue years, not days.

Serve a clean notice with the trust enclosed on day 30, and four months later everyone you served is out of time unless a defect in the notice stopped the clock (Probate Code § 16061.8); a late contest can even trigger a no-contest clause, as it did in Meiri v. Shamtoubi. A contest is brought when the petition is filed, not when it reaches you (Straley v. Gamble), so check the docket before you distribute. What a contest looks like from the other side is in our guide to how to contest a trust in California.

Which mistakes in the notice stop the 120-day clock?

Two cases from the same court draw the line. Harustak is the strict one: the 120 days "does not begin to run until the trustee serves a notice" that complies with the warning rule, where the Legislature wrote both the words and the format.

In Germino v. Hillyer the notice had the bold warning but omitted the line about requesting a copy of the trust. The trustees had already hand-delivered the trust to him. The court held the notice "was adequate to commence the limitations period", refused to demand an "idle act", and the contest was too late.

Do not read Germino as permission to be sloppy. The same opinion says deviations from a prescribed form "will be viewed with extreme disfavor", and it weighed prejudice only because the five items have no prescribed wording. Whether a defect stops the clock is a question for a judge; do not hand one the question.

Now the second clock. A person who receives the trust terms during the 120 days gets 60 days from that delivery if it lands later (Probate Code § 16061.8). Mail the terms on day 90 and that person's deadline moves to day 150; mail them with the notice and everything closes at 120. Any beneficiary or heir who asks after a death gets "a true and complete copy of the terms" anyway (Probate Code § 16061.5). Our guide to responding to a demand for a copy of the trust covers that request. The beneficiary's side of the same fight is in when a trustee won't give a copy or an accounting.

What are the deadlines around the notification by trustee?

Our guide to how long you have to contest a trust or will counts the same dates from the beneficiary's side. The deadline wizard turns them into a date.

What should a trustee do next?

1. List every beneficiary and heir with an address, and note how you worked out the heirs. See our trustee duties checklist for the other first-60-day jobs.
2. Draft the letter: five items, then the warning in the statute's words, bold, in its own paragraph. Enclose the trust and every amendment.
3. Mail it first-class to every name, the same day, inside the 60 days.
4. Sign a proof of service that day and keep it.
5. Calendar day 120 and check the docket before you distribute (Probate Code § 16061.9).
6. Past 60 days? Serve now, then talk to a lawyer about the exposure.