WillSum › How we check
About
How WillSum checks every figure
Primary sources, the gates that refuse an unsourced figure, the daily rebuild, the morning watcher, and how a correction is published.
Where a figure comes from
A court fee comes from the body that sets it: gov.uk, HMCTS, the Office of the Public Guardian, HMRC, the Scottish Courts and Tribunals Service, or the fees order on legislation.gov.uk. A firm price comes from that firm's own published page, quoted and dated. A comparison site is not a source. England and Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland are recorded separately, and the build refuses a statutory fee that names no nation.
What the build refuses
A figure with no source, no read date or no date it is due again does not render. A number typed into a page by hand does not render. A form does not render. Wording that hurries or frightens a reader does not render. Derived arithmetic has to say it is ours. Where a firm's page states a court fee, the build compares that figure with the official one every time it runs, and the official figure wins.
The daily rebuild
Vercel builds the live site from the main branch of this site's repository on GitHub, and a rebuild runs every morning at 06:55 UTC. A change pushed to that branch is published by the same kind of build. A figure changes only when its record changes. The checked date beside a figure is the day its source was read, not the day the rebuild ran.
What a recheck date does, and the morning watcher
Every figure carries the day its source was read and the day that read is due again. Both are in the open feed at /api/metrics.json.
A watcher runs every morning at 06:30 UTC. It never edits a page. It opens every source link on every page and flags one that has gone dead. It notices when the text of a source page it watches has changed. For three figures it reads the number off the official page itself and compares it with ours: the fee to register a lasting power of attorney, the probate application fee, and the Inheritance Tax nil-rate band. It lists every figure whose recheck date has passed or falls within the next seven days, and it confirms that the live site is the latest build.
Most figures are still re-read by a person on their recheck date: somebody opens the source and writes down what it says. The old figure stays up until then.
Probate pages
A probate page opens with the routes that cost nothing, then the court fee, then the firms. The build fails on scare wording, in the data and on the page.
Corrections
A correction happens when the source itself has moved, not because an email said so. The checked date beside the figure moves to the day the source was read again. How to write in is on the contact page.
Questions people ask
Does WillSum invent a figure it cannot source?
No. A figure without a primary source, a read date and a date it is due again is held back. A gap is left on the page.
Does the daily check rewrite a figure?
No. The morning watcher never edits a page. It flags a dead source link, a watched source page that has changed, and a figure past the date it was due a re-read. For three figures it also reads the official page and compares the number with ours.
Who corrects a wrong figure?
A person reads the source again. The figure moves when that source says it has moved. The contact page says what to send.