POA how easy / difficult is it to do yourself?

Good info here.

www.moneysavingexpert.com/family/power-of-attorney/

Very straightforward. I did the forms for my dm and then you pay for them to be registered: I did both the finance and health form and it was £80 each for registration. This was about 10 years ago.

Lots of good advice here. We used a solicitor but there were many reasons for that and when I do mine I will do it myself.

One thing the solicitor added was a statement for if any assets were held in investments rather than just house and savings acounts - our Dad only had a small stock and shares ISA but the wording was added so that funds could be managed by LPAs in case we wanted to switch funds or anything instead of just cashing in.

All too soon, I’m applying for probate which is also a faff and there’s printing and posting for that too but the LPAs were useful experience for both probate and my own planning.

Do you still have one of those local books-remember the things we used before everything was online? Our area still has a delivery and they are very good for things associated with older people (no offence/ageism intended-I know some old people are more tech savvy than our kids!) Or a county carer's handbook?
I found a man in those that did them cheap. It is just easier than doing it yourself, and for me, the cost was worth it, it was like one shift at work and would have taken me longer.

You don’t need a solicitor. Your DM needs to have capacity when signing the document and someone who can testify that DM is signing under free will (friend/neighbour who knows them well and for a certain period of time) Getting them signed in the right order is the hardest bit.

If low income can get assistance for cost of registering

Fir finance one we got it to be usable straight away rather than when capacity gone, so can manage finances easier that way

If more than one attorney need to decide whether to act jointly or jointly and severally (ie can make individual decision or always have to act jointly)

It’s very simple and much cheaper to do it yourself. Age Concern will also come
out and help you complete it. Just check and double check before sending it off. I’d recommend the jointly and severally option to keep things easier but obviously read carefully and make sure that works for your family.

Honestly, it’s very easy.

Read the notes, take it slow and steady, and do one at a time and you will be fine

www.gov.uk/power-of-attorney

It is easy to do
Health
Wealth
You will need a witness
Pay
Send off forms registered post

I wouldn’t pay a solicitor for this. I have done four.
As long as you have a good printer with plenty of ink as you fill it in online but need to print it off so everyone relevant can actually sign it.
I think the accompanying notes are very good and if you read them properly it is pretty straightforward.

We did the majority ourselves but paid for the 'certificate' part. Person needing the LPA has no friends to explain the situation and it can't be anyone related by birth or marriage. We contacted a company (Simply Social Work) and a member of their team sat with the person (nobody else present) to explain the process and to ensure they understood and agreed to it. We then signed the forms in the correct order, witnessed by a neighbour (care home and hospital staff are not allowed to be witnesses under their work contracts apparently) and sent them off. 6 weeks later it was all done and dusted.

We did it ourselves. Relatively straight forward just need time to read through the guide.

Exactly with @fairlygoodmother wrote.

We did them ourselves - two each, so four in all.
They are not difficult to do. We did most of them online and then printed them out to sign, which we did with a couple of friends present. We asked one to sign to confirm that we were of sound mind and understood what we were doing (or whatever the phrase is) and another to witness all the signatures.

As long as you are organised it will be fine.

What does that mean,the correct day order? What is the wrong date order?

It's explained in the instructions. There's a specified order in which people have to sign and date the forms. Some signatures have to be witnessed, so you must sign in the presence of the witness.

My neighbour had a solicitor do the poa for one of her parents and it was still rejected the first time. So having a solicitor doesn't guarantee everything will go smoothly.

Honestly it is so simple. Read through forms and notes thoroughly. Fill in those parts that don’t need a witness. Then get the witness to fill in their parts and be present when your DM signs. Sign it and send off. The advantage to doing it yourself is that when you need to do them for yourselves/ILs it will only take five minutes. Good luck

I did mine, my partner's, DDs, DSs, my friend's and her husband's. I did them all online and then printed them off. Very simple. I agree that it's definitely much easier to have everyone together to do the signing at the end.

I couldn't be bothered doing it ourselves (I would have been the 1 doing it) and got a solicitor to do it. To me it was worth the money.
Friend did it himself for his mother and it took lots of his time, filling in the forms etc and printing off and travelling to where she lived although he said it wasn't difficult wished he had also gone to a solicitor.

It's not hard to do at all but it is a faff. You can do it yourselves.

My tip is to ensure you tick the box that allows you to run her finances with her permission even if she still has capacity.

My sister and I figured it out ourselves. Print the forms, read carefully and discuss with parents, then get someone they know to witness the signatures. Next door neighbour did ours as they’d lived next door for decades. It really doesn’t need a solicitor, just half an hour’s peace and quiet to read through it all

It’s very easy, I did it for my mum - as a pp said, just get everyone in the same room and sign on the same day - it makes it a lot simpler.

It’s really easy as long as they know what they want, go through electronically on the gov.uk site and then print it at the end, it guides you through all the points as you answer them. I did DM last year and had no issues.

It’s not hard to do at all, just requires carefully reading all the instructions. Completing the forms is easy and the notes explain exactly what it all means. The only tricky part is making sure that all the people who have to sign do it in the right order.
Your Mum will have to talk to a trusted friend about what she’s planning, and the friend has to sign to say that this has happened. This is to prevent coercion. Just make sure that the friend doesn’t sign in the wrong order.
Having said that, my first attempt was rejected because I spelled my own name wrong so it’s not completely foolproof.