How to Fill Out the Capital One Certificate of Trust Form

Capital One’s Certificate of Trust and Account Conversion form lets you re-title existing personal checking, savings, or CD accounts into a revocable living trust without giving the bank your full trust agreement. You complete a five-page summary of your trust, have every trustee signature notarized, and send it in by mail, fax, or at a branch. Processing takes roughly ten business days once Capital One receives complete paperwork.¹

Who Can Use This Form

The form is built for revocable living trusts that already exist. It does not create a trust for you; you need a formal revocable living trust in place before you fill anything out.² Every current account holder must be 18 or older and listed on the form.

A few limits will stop the process cold if you miss them:

Minor accounts and business accounts cannot be re-titled into a trust using this form.²
Capital One caps the number of trustees, including the grantor, at three.²
The grantor is listed first and must also serve as a trustee on the account.

What to Have Ready Before You Start

Pull out your trust agreement, your Capital One account numbers, and a government-issued ID for each trustee. The instructions tell you to fill in fields exactly as they appear in the trust document, so you will be copying names, dates, and addresses directly from it. Even a small spelling difference between the form and the trust can hold up processing.

Where to Get the Form

Capital One posts the Certificate of Trust and Account Conversion as a PDF in its online help center. Printed copies are available at any Capital One branch or Café. If you cannot find it online, calling 800-655-BANK (2265) will get you to someone who can email or mail it to you.³

Filling Out the Form

The form runs five pages in labeled sections. Capital One will not accept an incomplete form, so work through every field even if one looks redundant.³

Trust Information

Enter the full legal name of the trust exactly as it appears in the agreement. You also need the trust formation date (the date the settlor originally signed), the trust’s physical street address (no P.O. boxes), and one tax identification number. For most revocable living trusts where the grantor is still alive, the tax ID is the grantor’s Social Security number. Irrevocable trusts and revocable trusts that have obtained their own tax ID use an EIN. An ITIN is also accepted.²

Two other questions appear here: the primary source of wealth or assets funding the trust, and whether the trust is primarily funded from offshore sources. Answer them honestly. They feed Capital One’s compliance review, and leaving them blank will delay you more than a truthful answer will.

Account Numbers

List every Capital One account you want moved into trust ownership, using the full account number for each. Accounts you want to keep in your personal name simply stay off the list. You do not have to convert everything at once.

Grantors and Trustees

The grantor is entered first. For every person listed, the form requires full legal name, complete residential address, tax ID (SSN or ITIN), email, and date of birth.² Every existing account holder must appear here for the conversion to go through. If your trust names more than three trustees, you will need to work with Capital One on which three to list.

Powers of Trustee

This section confirms that the trust agreement gives each trustee broad authority over deposit accounts, including opening and closing accounts, making deposits and withdrawals, endorsing checks, and signing account documents. The default language states that each trustee can act independently on any type of bank account for the trust.² If your trust actually requires co-trustee signatures, flag that before signing. Otherwise the form creates a mismatch between the trust’s real terms and how Capital One will run the account.

Certification and Signatures

By signing, you warrant that everything on the form is accurate and that no trust amendment contradicts what you represented. Capital One relies on that certification when re-titling, and the statement is made under penalty of perjury.³ Every listed trustee must sign, and every signature must be notarized.

Getting the Signatures Notarized

Every trustee signature needs a notary seal. Capital One will reject the form if any is missing.³ Each trustee has to appear before the notary in person with valid government-issued photo ID. Do not sign ahead of time; the notary needs to witness the actual signing.

If trustees live in different areas, they can each visit their own notary. The form only requires that every signature be notarized before you submit.

Submitting the Completed Form

Once every section is filled in and all signatures are notarized, you have three options:

Mail: Capital One Bank, P.O. Box 85123, Richmond, VA 23285³
Fax: 888-464-3220
In person at any Capital One branch or Café

There is no online upload option. If you fax the form, keep the original notarized pages. Capital One may ask for them later, and you will want them for your own records regardless.

What Happens After You Submit

Capital One’s compliance team reviews the form against its internal requirements. Expect about ten business days, longer during periods of high volume.¹ You will receive confirmation by email or mail once the account is re-titled.

Two effects of the conversion tend to catch people off guard. Any beneficiary designations previously added to the account are removed during re-titling, because the trust document itself now controls who inherits.² Check that your trust’s distribution terms actually cover what those beneficiary designations used to. Second, if your checking account used Capital One’s Free Savings Transfer for overdraft protection, that link is removed during conversion, and you may need to set overdraft protection up again.

Address changes for the trust account after conversion have to be handled by phone at 800-655-BANK (2265) rather than through the online portal.²

Updating the Certificate After a Trust Amendment

The form includes a commitment that outlives the initial submission. If you amend your trust in any way that makes the certificate inaccurate, you have ten days to execute an updated Certificate of Trust and deliver it to Capital One.² Common triggers include changing the trust’s name, changing beneficiaries in a way that affects trustee powers, or modifying trustee authority over financial accounts.

If you skip this, Capital One is entitled to keep relying on the most recent certificate you gave it. That can mean a trustee keeps access they should have lost, or a new trustee cannot act when they should be able to. Treat any trust amendment the same as an address change: update every institution holding trust assets, starting with the bank.

Adding or Removing a Trustee Later

Trustee changes after conversion use a different document, the Trust Maintenance Form, not another Certificate of Trust.¹ The same three-trustee cap applies. The grantor’s signature is required on every trustee change, and all signatures must again be notarized.⁴

Removals for death, resignation, or court order need supporting documentation: a death certificate, the relevant court order, or a physician’s notification, depending on the circumstances.⁴ One rule matters more than the others: Capital One requires at least one trustee to also be the grantor. If the sole grantor has to be removed (because of death, for example), the account must be closed rather than reassigned to a successor trustee. In that case, the successor should call 800-655-BANK to discuss options before submitting paperwork.

If removing a trustee changes the tax identification number on the account, you also need to complete and attach a W-9 certifying the new TIN.⁴

1
Capital One. How To Convert to Revocable Living Trust
2
Capital One. Certificate of Trust And Account Conversion
3
Capital One. Capital One Certificate of Trust And Account Conversion
4
Capital One. Trust Maintenance Form