EPTL § 7-5.1

Definitions · as in force on May 31, 2026

§ 7-5.1 Definitions

(a) A "beneficiary" is a person who is described by a depositor as a person for whom a trust account is established or maintained.

(b) A "depositor" is a person in whose name a trust account subject to this part is established or maintained.

(c) A "financial institution" is a bank, trust company, national banking association, savings bank, industrial bank, private banker, foreign banking corporation, federal savings and loan association, a savings institution chartered and supervised as a savings and loan or similar institution under federal law or the laws of a state, a federal credit union, or a credit union chartered and supervised under the laws of a state.

(d) A "trust account" includes a savings, share, certificate or deposit account in a financial institution established by a depositor describing himself as trustee for another, other than a depositor describing himself as acting under a will, trust instrument or other instrument, court order or decree.

Official sourcehttps://www.nysenate.gov/legislation/laws/EPT/7-5.1

In plain English

(a)–(d) For this part, a beneficiary is the named person for whom a trust account is held; a depositor is the person in whose name it is opened; a financial institution includes the listed regulated banks, savings institutions, and credit unions; and a trust account is an account styled by the depositor as trustee for another outside a separate will, trust instrument, or court order. ★

Marked in the text: penalties, time limits, sums of money. Editorial emphasis added by this edition; it does not appear in the statute as enacted.

In print

This provision appears in Volume 1 — The Surrogate's Court in Plain English; Volume 3 — The Surrogate's Court: Court Rules & the EPTL; Volume 5 — Your Career: Surrogate's Court in Plain English.