If you are an executor
Accepting the role, what the executor dashboard can do, and how to trigger or call off a vault transition.
An executor is the person an estate owner names to act when something happens to them. You do not manage their assets and you cannot read their vault. What you can do is declare that a triggering event has occurred, which starts the handover to the beneficiaries.
You get here by invitation. Nothing in this page applies until an estate owner has named you and you have accepted.
Accepting the invitation
The invitation email links to a Family Invitation card naming the estate, your role, and the relationship the owner recorded for you. Read the responsibilities line before you accept: an executor can declare someone dead, and the app will act on it. You can Accept or Decline.
Accepting drops you onto the executor dashboard.
You need a BlockWill account with the same email the invitation was sent to. If you do not have one yet, the link takes you through Log in or Create an account first. Signing up accepts the invitation for you, then a short onboarding follows.
The executor dashboard
Under Asset Owner Status there are three tiles, each with a Trigger button, one per event you are allowed to declare:
| Trigger | What it means |
|---|---|
| Death of Asset Owner | The owner is confirmed deceased |
| Incapacitation | The owner is alive but unable to manage their own affairs |
| Missing Person | The owner cannot be located |
Below them, the Beneficiary contacts card lists each beneficiary and lets you add extra email addresses and phone numbers with + Email and + Phone, so they can actually be reached when the transition fires. Worth doing now rather than on the day.
Triggering a transition
Click the tile for the event that has happened.
Write a justification. This is a permanent record of why you acted, so put the actual evidence in it: a certificate number, a date, who verified it.
Click Confirm Transition. A short progress message shows ("Recording on the blockchain...", then "Starting the handover...").
Confirming starts a cooldown, not an instant handover. The beneficiaries are not told during the cooldown, which is what makes the next section possible.
Calling off a false alarm
While the cooldown is running the dashboard shows Beneficiary cooldown is active with a countdown in days, hours, minutes and seconds, and offers Cancel vault relay. In the Cancel Vault Relay? dialog you can give a reason (optional) and confirm with Cancel Vault Relay (or click Keep Running to let it continue), and the vault goes back to being sealed. Nobody downstream ever knew.
The cancel window is exactly the cooldown. Once it elapses the beneficiaries are notified and the vault becomes a Legacy Vault, and there is no undo from the executor side.
What an executor cannot do
- Read the owner's assets, documents, or DigiWish while the vault is secure
- Change the owner's beneficiaries or allocations
- Unlock the vault: the vault key was never shared with you
Your power is limited to declaring the event. Everything after it is machinery the owner set up in Vault Relay.