Advance Directive

A legal document that records healthcare choices for a future time when a person may not be able to communicate. Requirements vary by location. Say It Last can record where the signed document is stored and whom to contact, but it is not an advance directive.

Related: Healthcare Proxy, Living Will

After-Death Checklist

A practical list of steps that may need attention after someone dies, such as contacting family, locating documents, caring for pets, notifying providers, reviewing bills, and following funeral or memorial wishes.

See: Trusted Contact Checklist

Asset Inventory

A list of financial, physical, and digital property, such as bank accounts, insurance, real estate, vehicles, websites, subscriptions, photographs, and online businesses. A useful inventory identifies where information is located without unnecessarily exposing private access details.

Beneficiary

A person, trust, charity, or other entity designated to receive money or property from an account, policy, trust, or estate. Beneficiary designations are maintained with the appropriate institution; a note in Say It Last does not change an official designation.

Backup Copy

A second protected copy of important information or documents kept in a separate secure location. Backups reduce the risk that essential records disappear when a phone, computer, account, or paper file becomes unavailable.

Chosen Family

People someone considers family through trust, love, and commitment rather than only through legal or biological relationships. Legal authority may still require formal documents, so chosen-family planning often works best when personal instructions and legal planning support each other.

Check-In Timer

A time-based safeguard that prompts a person to confirm they are okay. In Say It Last, the Toggle and Timer help control reminders and when a Trusted Contact may receive prepared information.

See: Toggle & Timer Demo

Cloud Storage

Online storage used for files such as photos, documents, videos, and backups. Final-instruction planning may include the service name, owner, billing details, and where authorized access information is maintained.

Data Encryption

A security method that converts readable information into protected data that requires authorized access to interpret. Encryption helps protect information while stored and while transmitted.

See: Say It Last Security

Death Notification List

A prepared list of people and organizations that may need to be told after a death, including family, friends, employers, advisors, insurers, clubs, service providers, and online communities.

Digital Asset

Digital property or information with personal, practical, sentimental, or financial value. Examples include email, photographs, cloud files, social profiles, websites, domains, creator accounts, reward points, cryptocurrency, and online businesses.

Digital Estate Plan

A plan for identifying, accessing, preserving, transferring, memorializing, or deleting digital accounts and property after death or incapacity. It should account for applicable law, platform rules, ownership, privacy, and official legal documents.

Digital Executor

A person named or authorized to carry out instructions involving digital assets. The role and legal authority vary by jurisdiction. A Digital Executor is not automatically the same as a Say It Last Trusted Contact.

Digital Inheritance

The transfer or management of digital property, rights, content, and account access after death. What can be inherited depends on ownership, terms of service, beneficiary tools, licensing rules, and local law.

Digital Legacy

The online information, accounts, creative work, photographs, messages, and digital reputation a person leaves behind. Digital legacy planning helps loved ones understand what should be preserved, transferred, memorialized, or removed.

Digital Vault

A protected digital space used to organize sensitive records, instructions, documents, or access information. Say It Last provides a private Vault for guidance that can be organized and released according to the user’s settings.

Do-Not-Resuscitate Order (DNR)

A medical order concerning cardiopulmonary resuscitation. A DNR must be created and handled through qualified healthcare professionals under applicable law. Say It Last may help identify where an official order is located but does not create one.

Emergency Access

A controlled way for an authorized person to obtain information during an emergency. Good emergency-access planning balances speed, privacy, authentication, and clear limits on what the person can see or do.

End-of-Life Planning

Preparing for medical, legal, financial, funeral, digital, household, pet, and personal matters that may arise near the end of life or after death. It can include formal documents as well as the everyday answers families often struggle to find.

Estate

The property, money, rights, debts, and obligations associated with a person at death. What belongs to an estate and how it is handled depends on ownership, contracts, beneficiary designations, trusts, and law.

Estate Planning

The process of arranging how property, responsibilities, healthcare decisions, and legal authority should be handled during incapacity and after death. Estate planning often includes wills, trusts, powers of attorney, advance directives, and beneficiary designations. Say It Last complements these tools with practical guidance; it does not replace them.

Executor

The person or institution authorized through a will and court process to administer an estate. An Executor has legal duties; a Say It Last Trusted Contact receives the information the user chose to share. The same person may serve both roles, but the roles are different.

Final Arrangements

Decisions and preferences involving funeral services, cremation, burial, body donation, memorials, obituaries, ashes, religious or cultural practices, music, readings, gatherings, and the people who should be involved.

Final Instructions

Practical and personal guidance left for others to follow if a person dies or cannot communicate. Final instructions may cover people to call, pets, home access, documents, subscriptions, digital accounts, final wishes, and messages. They do not automatically create legal authority.

Final Wishes

A person’s preferences for what should happen near the end of life and after death. Some wishes may require legal or medical documentation; others are personal guidance intended to reduce uncertainty for loved ones.

Funeral Planning

Preparing decisions about a funeral, memorial, burial, cremation, obituary, costs, providers, speakers, readings, music, and gatherings. Preplanning can help loved ones avoid making every decision during a difficult moment.

Guardian

A person legally authorized to make certain decisions for another person, often a minor or an adult who lacks capacity. Guardianship is created under law and is separate from naming a Trusted Contact in an app.

Healthcare Power of Attorney

A legal document authorizing someone to make healthcare decisions when the person granting authority cannot do so. Names and requirements vary by state or country. Say It Last can point to the document and decision-maker but does not grant legal authority.

Healthcare Proxy

A person authorized to make healthcare decisions for someone who cannot communicate or decide. The term may also refer to the legal document used to appoint that person.

Important Documents List

A record showing which documents exist and where they are stored. It may include a will, trust, deed, insurance policy, advance directive, power of attorney, tax return, identification, military record, business agreement, and pet records.

Incapacity Planning

Preparing for a time when illness, injury, cognitive decline, or another condition may prevent someone from managing decisions or communicating. It may involve legal documents, care preferences, account management, household instructions, and trusted helpers.

Inactivity Trigger

A rule that starts a check-in or release process after a person does not respond within a selected period. A thoughtfully designed inactivity trigger should include reminders, clear timing, and a way to prevent accidental release.

Instructions Report

A clear, organized summary of the guidance a person prepared. In Say It Last, the Trusted Contact receives a report containing the approved information after the Trigger is activated.

See: What Your Trusted Contact Receives

Just-in-Case Plan

A concise plan containing the people, information, and next steps someone may need during an unexpected absence, hospitalization, surgery, emergency, incapacity, or death.

Legacy Contact

A person designated through a platform’s built-in tools to manage limited parts of an account after death. Permissions vary by provider. A platform Legacy Contact is different from a Say It Last Trusted Contact, though one person may fill both roles.

Life Insurance

A contract that may pay a death benefit to named beneficiaries. Useful planning notes can include the insurer, policy number, agent, premium source, and where the official policy and beneficiary information are stored.

Living Will

A legal document describing certain medical treatment preferences if a person cannot communicate. It is different from a last will and testament, which generally addresses property and estate matters after death.

Memorial Instructions

Preferences for a memorial or celebration of life, including location, tone, guests, speakers, music, readings, photographs, food, charitable gifts, livestreaming, or whether no service is desired.

Memorialization

The process of preserving or presenting someone’s memory, physically or digitally. Online memorialization may involve changing the status of a social account, preserving photographs, creating a tribute page, or archiving creative work.

Online Account Inventory

A list of online accounts and services, usually organized by category, owner, billing method, and intended action. It can include email, social media, banking, shopping, subscriptions, domains, cloud storage, utilities, and business tools.

Obituary Planning

Preparing names, dates, relationships, achievements, stories, preferred wording, photographs, and publication choices for an obituary. Planning ahead can help ensure accuracy and preserve the details the person values most.

Password Inheritance

Planning how authorized people can obtain or use account access after death or incapacity. Safe planning should consider password-manager emergency access, platform legacy tools, two-factor authentication, legal authority, and the risks of storing raw passwords.

Password Manager

A tool that stores, generates, and autofills login credentials for everyday use. Say It Last is not a password manager: it is designed to organize guidance and release approved information to a Trusted Contact when the user’s Trigger is activated. Many people may use both.

Personal Message

A note, letter, instruction, story, expression of gratitude, apology, reassurance, or other communication prepared for a particular person. A personal message can be practical, emotional, or both.

Pet Care Plan

Instructions for a pet’s immediate and long-term care, including caregiver contacts, feeding, medication, veterinary information, routines, behavior, insurance, identification, supplies, and funding.

Power of Attorney

A legal document authorizing another person to act in specified matters. Authority, duration, and terminology vary. A Power of Attorney generally ends at death and does not result merely from being named a Trusted Contact.

Privacy by Design

An approach that builds privacy protections into a product’s structure and defaults rather than adding them later. It emphasizes limited collection, controlled access, secure handling, and clear user choices.

Probate

A court-supervised process used in many jurisdictions to validate a will, appoint an estate representative, address claims, and distribute estate property. Whether probate is required depends on local law and how assets are owned.

Release Conditions

The rules that must be satisfied before prepared information becomes available. These may involve Toggle status, timing, reminders, check-ins, authentication, or other safeguards.

Revocation

The cancellation of permission, authority, access, or a prior instruction. The ability to revoke depends on the document, platform, timing, and whether information has already been delivered or acted upon.

Secure Document Storage

A protected place for important paper or digital records, such as a fire-resistant safe, attorney’s office, bank box where appropriate, encrypted drive, or reputable secure cloud service. Trusted people should know where documents are without creating unnecessary exposure.

Social Media Legacy

The accounts, posts, photographs, messages, audiences, and digital identity a person leaves on social platforms. Planning can state whether accounts should be memorialized, archived, transferred where allowed, or deleted.

Subscription Cancellation List

A record of recurring services and charges that someone may need to review, pause, transfer, or cancel. It may include streaming, memberships, software, storage, deliveries, utilities, phone service, and professional subscriptions.

Survivor Checklist

A compassionate, ordered list that helps family or trusted people handle immediate responsibilities after a death. It can reduce confusion by separating urgent tasks from those that can wait.

Trigger

The event or confirmed condition that starts a release process. In Say It Last, the Trigger works with the Toggle and Timer so prepared guidance is not simply shared all the time.

Toggle

The control used in Say It Last to indicate whether the release process is active. The Toggle helps the user control when check-ins and potential delivery should occur.

See: How the Toggle Works

Trusted Contact

The person selected in Say It Last to receive the approved guidance when the Trigger is activated. A Trusted Contact should be dependable, able to follow instructions calmly, and willing to take on the role. This designation does not by itself grant legal, medical, or financial authority.

See: Trusted Contact Guide

Trusted Contact Report

The organized information a Say It Last user approved for delivery to their Trusted Contact. It is intended to provide a clear place to begin, with instructions, contacts, and other prepared guidance.

See: What Your Trusted Contact Receives

Two-Factor Authentication (2FA)

A security method requiring two forms of verification, such as a password plus a code, authenticator app, security key, or biometric check. Legacy planning should account for how authorized access will work without weakening security today.

Vault

The private area in Say It Last where a user organizes guidance, contacts, messages, and important information. The Vault is designed to keep prepared answers together until the user’s release settings allow delivery.

Will (Last Will and Testament)

A legal document that states how certain property should be distributed after death and may name an Executor or guardians. Requirements vary. Say It Last can record where a will is stored and provide practical instructions, but it is not a will.

What to Do When Someone Dies

A common search phrase for the immediate steps after a death. The right order depends on the circumstances and location, but often begins with the appropriate medical or emergency authority, close family, the person leading arrangements, a funeral provider, and the location of essential documents and instructions.

Start here: Trusted Contact Checklist