In the fall of 2024, the Arizona Department of Child Safety (DCS) mailed letters to parents who once had an open dependency and/or severance case.
Did you receive a letter? Visit the DCS letter page for more information.
Probate
Glossaries
| Term | Main definition |
|---|---|
| Account | A contract of deposit between a depositor and a financial institution and includes a checking account, savings account, certificate of deposit and share account OR an arrangement under a terms-of-service agreement in which a custodian carries, maintains, processes, receives or stores a digital asset of the user or provides goods or services to the user. |
| Accounting Period | A calendar year unless another twelve month period is selected by a fiduciary and includes a portion of a calendar year or other twelve month period that begins when an income interest begins or ends when an income interest ends. |
| Admitting Officer | A psychiatrist or other physician or psychiatric and mental health nurse practitioner with experience in performing psychiatric examinations who has been designated as an admitting officer of the evaluation agency by the person in charge of the evaluation agency. |
| Adult | A person who is at least 18 years of age. |
| Agent | A person who is authorized to make decisions concerning the health care of another person and a person who is authorized to make decisions for another person under a natural death act. |
| Bank | Includes commercial banks, savings banks, trust companies, and any person or association of persons, whether incorporated or not, carrying on the business of banking. |
| Basis for compensation | An hourly rate, a fixed fee or contingency fee agreement and reimbursable costs. |
| Beneficiary | As it relates to a trust beneficiary, includes a person who has any present or future interest, vested or contingent, and also includes the owner of an interest by assignment or other transfer. As it relates to a charitable trust, beneficiary includes any person entitled to enforce the trust. As it relates to a beneficiary of a beneficiary designation, beneficiary refers to a beneficiary of an insurance or annuity policy, an account with pay on death designation, a security registered in beneficiary form or a pension, profit sharing, retirement or similar benefit plan, or any other nonprobate transfer at death. As it relates to a beneficiary designated in a governing instrument, beneficiary includes a grantee of a deed, a devisee, a trust beneficiary, a beneficiary of a beneficiary designation, a donee, appointee or taker in default of a power of appointment and a person in whose favor a power of attorney or a power held in any person, fiduciary or representative capacity is exercised. |
| Beneficiary designation | Refers to a governing instrument naming a beneficiary of an insurance or annuity policy, of an account with pay on death designation, of a security registered in beneficiary form or of a pension, profit sharing, retirement or similar benefit plan, or any other nonprobate transfer at death. |
| Beneficiary form | A registration of a security that indicates the present owner of the security and the intention of the owner regarding the person who will become the owner of the security on the death of the owner. |
| Benefit plan | The plan an employer has for the benefit of an employee or partner. |
| Broker | A person lawfully engaged in the business of effecting transactions in securities or commodities for the account of the person or for the account of others. |
| Catalogue of electronic communications | Information that identifies each person with which a user has had an electronic communication, the time and date of the communication and the electronic address of the person. |
| Certified paper original | A tangible document that contains both the text of an electronic will and any self-proving affidavit concerning the electronic will. |
| Charitable trust | A trust, or portion of a trust, created for a charitable purpose described in Arizona Revised Statutes, Section 14-10405, Subsection A. |
| Chief medical officer | The chief medical officer under the supervision of the superintendent of the state hospital. |
| Community property | Property of a husband and wife that is acquired during the marriage and that is community property as prescribed in Arizona Revised Statutes, Section 25-211. |
| Conservator | A person who is appointed by a court to manage the estate of a protected person. |
| Contact order | An order allowing contact between a ward and a person with a significant relationship to the ward. |
| Content of an electronic communication | Information concerning the substance or meaning of the communication that meets all of the following requirements:
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