HRS §490:4-405
What happens to checks when a customer dies or becomes incompetent
Read the official text at capitol.hawaii.gov ↗This section says a bank can keep handling checks and account money after a customer dies or becomes legally incompetent, unless the bank knows about it and has time to act. Even after learning of death, the bank may pay checks written before death for a short time unless told to stop.
everyone
The statute, as written — Death or incompetence of customer
A copy, taken August 20, 2026. The version published by the Legislature is the one that governs, and it may have changed since. Check it before relying on anything here.
(a) A payor or collecting bank's authority to accept, pay, or collect an item or to account for proceeds of its collection, if otherwise effective, is not rendered ineffective by incompetence of a customer of either bank existing at the time the item is issued or its collection is undertaken if the bank does not know of an adjudication of incompetence. Neither death nor incompetence of a customer revokes the authority to accept, pay, collect, or account until the bank knows of the fact of death or of an adjudication of incompetence and has reasonable opportunity to act on it. (b) Even with knowledge, a bank may for ten days after the date of death pay or certify checks drawn on or before that date unless ordered to stop payment by a person claiming an interest in the account.
LawTrove is not legal advice. The summary above is a computer-generated restatement — the authoritative text is the official version linked above.