Services
The company you run
We administer private trust companies. Your private trust company is the trustee, and we keep the meetings, the minutes, and the books so that the board has a record when it decides. If you already have a lawyer, an accountant, and an investment adviser, keep them. That work is not what we are here for.
Somerell administers private trust companies in Wyoming. It is not a trust company or a bank. It does not act as trustee or in any other fiduciary capacity, and does not offer to. It is not chartered or supervised by the Wyoming Division of Banking. Nothing on this site is legal, tax or investment advice.
Your private trust company.The trustee. Decides.
Somerell.Administration. Records.
Accepting a trust
The board decides whether the company will accept.
Accepting a trust, Somerell
We prepare the file the board is looking at.
Investments
The board, its committee, or the adviser named in the trust decides.
Investments, Somerell
Records the direction and reconciles the statements.
Distributions
The committee or the board decides.
Distributions, Somerell
Logs the request, records the decision, and matches the payment to it.
Advisers
The board appoints them.
Advisers, Somerell
We keep them informed of what the file shows.
Tax returns
The accountant prepares them.
Tax returns, Somerell
We supply the books.
Legal documents
Counsel drafts them.
Legal documents, Somerell
We keep the signed copies.
Board and governance recordThe calendar, and the paper the board actually has in front of it when it meets.
- Meeting calendar, agendas, and board papers.
- Minutes and resolutions.
- Registers.
- Upkeep of the company's policies.
Trust recordsEach instrument, kept as it was signed, and the dates it sets.
- Instruments, kept as signed.
- Inventories.
- Directions received.
- A calendar of the dates each instrument sets.
Books and reportingBooks for the company and for each trust, in a form the accountant can use.
- Accounting records for the company and each trust.
- Statements.
- The reports the instruments require.
- The package the tax preparer needs.
DistributionsThe request, the decision, and the payment, kept so they can be matched later.
- Requests logged.
- Sent to whoever holds the power.
- The decision recorded.
- The payment matched to it.
AccountsOpened in your company's name. We prepare the paperwork and reconcile the statements, and we do not hold the assets.
- Accounts are opened in your company's name at the bank and custodian its board chooses.
- We prepare the paperwork and reconcile the statements.
- We do not hold assets.
AdvisersOne person the existing advisers can call, rather than a new adviser.
- One point of contact for counsel.
- The same for the accountant.
- The same for the investment adviser and the custodian.
Which companies
The company we spend the most time on is the unregulated private trust company, which Wyoming calls a private family trust company. It has no capital requirement and no regular examinations, which means its own record is what later shows that it acted as a trustee should. We also administer regulated, chartered family trust companies.
We are not a trust company, and we do not act as trustee or in any other fiduciary capacity, nor do we want to. We administer your family's private trust company, and that is the whole of the work.
What we do not do
- Act as trustee, protector, trust adviser, or in any fiduciary role.
- Sit on your board or committees.
- Decide or approve investments or distributions.
- Hold assets.
- Give legal, tax, or investment advice.
- Replace the advisers you have.
How it starts
- A first conversation with you and your counsel, about the company you already have or the one you are thinking of forming.
- Counsel drafts, and the board, once there is one, decides what to sign. We do not draft, and we do not sit on the board.
- The services agreement is with your private trust company, not with you personally.
- After that, the work is the ordinary cycle: the calendar, the meetings, the books, and the reports the instruments require.
Questions
Is Somerell a trust company?
No. We administer a family's private trust company. We are not one.
Will Somerell act as our trustee?
No, and we do not want that role. If you have a private trust company, that company is the trustee.
Will someone from Somerell sit on our board, or act as protector or trust adviser?
No. Those seats are where decisions get made, and we support the people who sit in them rather than taking the seats ourselves.
Does Somerell hold our assets?
No. The accounts are opened in your company's name, at the bank and custodian the board chooses.
Do you work outside Wyoming?
The companies we administer are Wyoming private trust companies. If yours is somewhere else, tell us that in the note and we will say so plainly if it is not work we do.
Which kind of private trust company do you work with?
Mostly the unregulated kind, which Wyoming calls a private family trust company. We also administer regulated, chartered family trust companies.
Do we change advisers?
No. Keep the lawyer, the accountant, and the investment adviser you already have. We can be a point of contact for them, and we do not replace them. There is a separate note for those advisers if they want the boundary written out.
What if we have no company yet?
Tell us that. The first conversation is still with you and your counsel. Forming the company, and deciding whether to form one, is their work with you. Administration starts when there is a company to administer.
If you are the lawyer, the planner, the family office, or the accountant, the same boundary is written out by role on the advisers page.