Updated September 7, 2026. Quick answer: In Kansas, once the personal representative publishes notice to creditors, a creditor has 4 months to file a claim; and a creditor who is personally mailed notice gets 30 days.
What is the creditor-claim deadline in Kansas?
| Once notice to creditors is published | 4 months |
| If notice is never published (absolute deadline) | No independent death-based bar; see note below |
| Creditor personally mailed notice | 30 days |
“All demands…shall be forever barred from payment unless the demand is presented within the later of: (a) four months from the date of first publication of notice under K.S.A. 59-2236…; or (b) if the identity of the creditor is known or reasonably ascertainable, 30 days after actual notice was given…”
Source: Kan. Stat. Ann. § 59-2239
What makes Kansas different
Kansas has no death-anchored outer bar independent of notice at all; the deadline is tied exclusively to publication or actual notice.
Does this deadline apply the same way if the estate never opens probate?
These deadlines are creatures of the probate process itself; they run once an estate is opened (by publication, mailing, appointment, or the grant of letters, depending on Kansas’s own rule above). A creditor of a decedent whose estate never enters probate at all is not cut off by this particular statute, though the underlying debt’s own ordinary statute of limitations still applies.
Sources
| Statute | Kan. Stat. Ann. § 59-2239 |
| Kansas courts (general reference) | Kansas judicial branch |
| Confidence | High |
Every statute quoted on this page was read directly from the state’s own legislature/code site this session, or, where that site blocked automated access, from a reputable legal-citation mirror quoting the same official text with its official citation (disclosed below). General information, not legal advice; the exact deadline in a given estate can turn on facts (whether a personal representative was appointed, whether notice was ever published or mailed) that only your own probate court file can confirm.