How to Find a Deceased Person's Subscriptions and Recurring Charges

By The HeirLoft Team · June 14, 2026

When someone dies, their subscriptions don't stop. Streaming services, cloud storage, memberships, software, news, fitness apps — each one keeps billing the card or bank account on file until somebody actively cancels it or the payment finally fails. No service watches obituaries or death records, so the charges simply continue.

The hard part usually isn't canceling. It's finding everything that's still charging — often scattered across an email inbox, two app stores, and a card statement nobody has looked at in months. This guide walks through how to track it all down methodically.

Why this is harder than it sounds

There's no central registry of someone's subscriptions. Every company bills independently, and the charges keep coming until the underlying card or bank account is frozen or closed — which can take weeks. Three things make the hunt especially tricky:

• Annual subscriptions hide. A service that bills once a year won't show up in a single month's statement, so it's easy to miss entirely.
• App-store and bundled billing obscure the source. Many subscriptions are billed through Apple, Google, a cable provider, or a phone carrier, so they don't appear as an obvious line item from the service itself.
• Family and shared plans look like one charge but affect several people, which changes how you should handle them.

Where to look

Work through these sources in order. Together they'll surface the large majority of recurring charges.

1. Bank and credit card statements — at least 12 months. Pull statements from every card and account, including secondary or business cards. Scan for charges of consistent amounts that repeat monthly, and go back a full year so annual renewals don't slip past you.

2. The email inbox — often more complete than statements. Subscription services send receipts, renewal notices, and welcome emails, which makes email the single richest source. Search for terms like receipt, renewal, your subscription, invoice, payment, welcome to, and free trial. This often reveals services that bill through a third party and never showed a clear line on the statement.

3. App-store subscriptions. A large share of app subscriptions are billed through the platforms, not the service directly. On Apple, look under Settings → the account name → Subscriptions. On Google Play, open the Play Store → Subscriptions. These won't show up as separate card charges.

4. A password manager or saved browser logins. If you have lawful access, a password manager or the browser's saved-passwords list is close to a complete map of the person's online accounts.

5. The phone carrier and physical mail. Streaming perks and add-ons sometimes ride on the cell-phone bill. Paper still arrives too — magazines, box subscriptions, and memberships often send physical mail that points to an active account.

A note on access — and the law

You generally cannot simply log in with the deceased person's credentials. Computer-access law and most platforms' terms make using someone else's login a gray area, even with the best intentions. The cleaner route is to use each company's bereavement or account-closure process.

To close most accounts, you'll typically need a certified copy of the death certificate and proof of your authority to act for the estate — for an executor, that usually means letters testamentary. Keep several certified copies on hand: companies generally won't accept photocopies, and each has its own procedure.

If you're the one administering the estate, finding accounts is one piece of a larger job — see the broader digital estate checklist for executors.

This article is general information, not legal advice. What you're permitted to access, and who has authority to act, varies by state and by situation. For anything specific, check with the attorney handling the estate or your local probate process.

The blind spots most families miss

• Family and shared plans. When the account holder who pays for a shared plan dies, everyone on it is affected — a music family plan, for example, can drop all members to the free tier once the payment fails. If others depend on the plan, ask the company about transferring ownership rather than simply canceling.
• Third-party billing. If there's no cancel button inside a service, it's probably billed through Apple, Google, or a cable or carrier bundle. Cancel at that billing partner instead.
• Auto-delivery. Shopping accounts may have recurring physical shipments set up. Closing the account stops the deliveries, but it's worth checking before you do.

A quick checklist

• Gather certified death certificates and proof of authority (letters testamentary).
• Pull 12 months of statements from every account and card.
• Search the email inbox for receipts and renewals.
• Check Apple and Google subscriptions.
• For each service, note the name, amount, billing source, and renewal date.
• Contact each company's bereavement line to cancel — or transfer, where others rely on it.
• Keep a running record of what you canceled and when.

Once you've found everything, here's how to cancel each subscription, platform by platform.

The real lesson: make this easier for your own family

If you take one thing from this, let it be this. The reason tracking these charges is so painful is that almost no one leaves a list. Every subscription you have to hunt down is one a loved one never wrote down — and one day, someone may have to do the same for you.

The single most useful thing you can do is keep an up-to-date list of your own subscriptions and accounts somewhere your family can actually find it. That's exactly what HeirLoft is for: it finds the recurring charges you've forgotten and keeps them in one place your heirs can use, so no one has to comb through a year of statements to piece your life together.

If that's a task you'd rather your own family never face, here's how to leave an organized list of your accounts for them.

See how HeirLoft helps you leave a list for your family

Finding everything takes patience, but a methodical pass through statements, email, and app stores will surface the vast majority of what's still charging. And once you've been through it, you'll understand exactly why leaving your own list matters.