New York Creditor Claim Period

Updated September 7, 2026. Quick answer: New York does not use the death-based or publication-triggered rule most states use. Deadline for fiduciary safe-harbor (not a claim bar): 7 months from the date letters are issued.

What is the creditor-claim deadline in New York?

“If any claim is not presented within 7 months from the date of issue of letters, the fiduciary shall not be chargeable for any assets or moneys that he may have paid in good faith in satisfaction of any lawful claims or of any legacies or distributions to the legatees or distributees of the decedent before such claim was presented.”

Source: N.Y. Surrogate’s Court Procedure Act (SCPA) § 1802

What makes New York different

New York’s SCPA 1802 does not extinguish creditor claims at all; missing the 7-month window only strips the fiduciary’s protection for good-faith distributions already made; the underlying claim survives subject to the ordinary statute of limitations.

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 New York’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

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.