phrasal verbs: to pay over (wills and testaments)

Posted on October 19, 2006
Filed under 2-minute English, Listening, Phrasal verbs, Upper intermediate |

 
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Transcript

Hello and welcome to another edition of 2-minute English, here at Better at English dot com. This post is in response to an email question from E.G. (who I think comes from Greece).

I have a question about a phrasal verb that I read in a will. What exactly does
pay over mean and what does survivorshipmean?

Thanks very much for your question, E. Unfortunately, to give you a really great answer I would need to have a lot more context. And because I am not a lawyer, you should probably take what I say with a very large grain of salt. Legal documents use language in very special ways, and it’s easy to be misled if you apply everyday English knowledge to legal texts. So with that disclaimer out of the way, here is what my research has turned up for to pay over (I’ll cover survivorship separately).

Put very simply, from what I can tell “to pay over” just means to pay. To transfer money from one person (or entity) to another. In the context of a will or testament, it means that whoever has the deceased’s money or property would transfer ownership of it to the person it was bequeathed to in the will. For example, if I had left 1000 dollars to you in my will, and then I died, then whoever had the money (probably my bank) would “pay it over” to you once all of the complicated legal processes were finished.

Here are some (very scary) example legalese sentences using “to pay over” in the context of wills and testaments. I warn you, these sentences are not for the faint of heart, so you might want to go to the website and actually read the transcript because it will be a lot for you to process aurally.

If such child shall have then attained the age of 30 years, my trustees shall transfer, pay over and deliver to such child outright the following amount: link

Nevertheless I empower by trustees to advance and pay over to my said sons any part not exceeding one half of the amounts ordered to be retained for their own respective absolute use and benefit if my trustees shall deem it to be for their advantage and expedient so to do link

Oh man, that was a mouthful.

And I hereby direct my executors, the survivors or survivor of them, within six months after my decease, to pay over the sum of two thousand pounds sterling to such persons as shall be duly appointed by the Selectmen of Boston and the corporation of Philadelphia, to receive and take charge of their respective sums, of one thousand pounds each, for the purposes aforesaid. link

Heavy sigh. That last one actually made my brain hurt.

I’m definitely not a legal expert, so those of you with more expertise in this area are welcome to help me out on this one if I’ve gone astray. Part of being a responsible teacher is being able to admit it when you don’t have all the answers!

Thanks for tuning in to this edition of 2-minute English. And thanks to everyone who’s sent questions and feedback about the site over the past few days. I’ll be recording a bunch of new podcasts for you all this weekend, taking your feedback and questions into account. Maybe by then I’ll be over this darn cold that I caught on my trip to Mexico…

As always, the full transcript of this podcast is available at our website, Better at English dot com.

Bye for now!

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Comments

4 Responses to “phrasal verbs: to pay over (wills and testaments)”

  1. Kristof on October 19th, 2006 23:17

    It always baffles me how “English Legalese” makes a lot more sense than “Dutch Legalese”. I’m running a Dutch legalese website for a friend of mine so I get my dose of Dutch legalese every month and although I’m becoming quite fluent in it, there’s still a fair dose of gibberish in between the less-expensive words.

    When reading some of the full excerpts in English, it somehow makes more sense than a lot of the Dutch words.

    My marriage prenup is a lot more complicated than the Trust and the Will document you put up here.

    Also, on the term of “pay over”, I think it’s only used where a third party actually transfers the money. This may happen for any number of reasons: the person who is transferring the money is no longer capable of doing so, be it that he is deceased or that he is no longer mentally capable of doing so, or otherwise. This, as far as I can tell, is the difference between “paying” and “paying over”. Paying would be an act between two parties whereas Paying Over is an act in which a third party is involved. I’d say you hit that one right on the head!

    And now I’m really off to my beauty-sleep!

  2. Lori on October 22nd, 2006 12:12

    Thanks for your input, Kristof. Not having experience with the Dutch language (my vocab begins and ends with “pindakaas” and some swear words) I’ll have to take your eminently qualified word for it. If Dutch legalese is more obtuse and convoluted than its English counterpart, then all I can do is offer my condolences. ;-)

    Legal language probably has to be complicated in order to cover as many situations and weed out as many loopholes as possible, but sheesh! All the relative clauses and antiquated expressions make my head spin. I’ll never be an expert in legal English. (Far from it; just the sight of a “heretofore” or a “hitherto” sends me running in terror.)

  3. Cornelius Ringe on October 25th, 2006 10:03

    Hi, great podcast! Just wanna let you know!

    And: is it possible that you are furthermore (correct grammar?) a great guitarist, too?

    :-))

  4. Lori on October 26th, 2006 11:32

    Hi Cornelius,

    Thanks for the nice comment :-)

    As for the grammar in your sentence, you should definitely delete the colon after “And”.

    Putting “furthermore” and “too” in the same sentence is a tautology (”needless repetition of an idea, statement, or word”). Here’s how I would have written your sentence, staying as close as possible to your original phrasing:

    And is it possible that you are also a great guitarist?

    By the way, some usage mavens still reject beginning a sentence with a co-ordinating conjunction (and, but, or, etc.). But that’s nonsense. Even so, if your writing instructor wants you to follow this (stupid) prescriptive rule, then you should do it.

    And yes, I do play guitar, but my “greatness” is eminently debatable! :-)

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