Lasting powers of attorney - can anyone help

[attorneypowers]

My parents are both still with us 🙏🏻
I have a DBro and a DSis
Can we all put on for a
LPA for health and finances?
Do we all have to sign it together?? At the same time?
Also does anyone know what the length of time to
Register with public guardian is at the moment?

Just did a financial LPA, think it took about 4 months. No, there is a specific order of signing with witnesses so you don’t have to be together. We did it online and printed the docs out for signing.

Done one for my mum recently. You don't all have to sign it literally together, but it does need to be signed in the correct order. The form is very straightforward to complete. Health and finances are separate. Someone will have to witness that your parents are capable of signing and you are not forcing them. I think it took about 3 months to come back.

I have my aunt on my Mum's LPOA, I can't remember if you can have more than two people. We didn't need to sign at the same time.

Yes you can all be on it together - I did it online and printed the document for us to sign using the same date.
it’s taken 8 weeks to be notified of a 4 week notice period before it will be issued - so 3 months total if it happens.

I recently signed one for my dad, jointly with my brother & sister but we didn’t have to physically be there to sign it as the same time.

Each signature needs to be witnessed.

You can do both health & finance or one or the other, depending on what your parents want to do.

I don’t know about the length of time for registering but my dad did his through a solicitor and they’re sorting it all out for him.

Yes you can have 3 attorneys. You don't need to sign at the same time but your parent needs to sign their section (section 9?) first, then their 'certificate provider' (guarantor who signs to say that they are signing of their own volition) then you all sign after that . . .

Just be aware that when having more than 1 person acting you can either choose to have any on the people acting alone, or all have to act together. For the Financial one, if its all of you together, that can complicate things.
*If there’s more than one attorneyIf you’re appointing more than one person, you must decide if they’ll make decisions:

• separately or together - sometimes called ‘jointly and severally’ - which means attorneys can make decisions on their own or with other attorneys
• together - sometimes called ‘jointly’ - which means all the attorneys have to agree on the decision

You can also choose to let them make some decisions ‘jointly’, and others ‘jointly and severally’. Attorneys who are appointed jointly must all agree or they cannot make the decision* https://www.gov.uk/power-of-attorney/choose

Worth thinking about whether you want them jointly or jointly and severally, ie can you each act alone or do you all need to act together. Or some families have one person doing health and the other finance.
It’s quite common in healthcare I believe that people don’t realise that they need a separate one for health issues.

Hi, the signatures are the most complex thing in terms that they all have to be signed in order of dates and all witnessed. It can get a bit complicated when you have multiple attorneys involved
but other wise it’s straight forward if you keep it simple.
we did it ourselves without solicitor or Which
but we looked at advice and went down the route of referring in the LPOA to an “expression of wishes”, but keeping details out OF LPOA itself except for really critical things. . This means I tell my attorneys to read the expression of wishes which they should try to follow but in itself is not a legal document, more guidance. And then I can shove loads of details in there, which can be changed over time as my wishes and needs change. For instance I’m currently dealing with my DF who has just been diagnosed with dementia, we’ve been through it all with sectioning etc and I’ve learnt a huge amount form that about what I’d want if same thing happened to me. I also have different opinions than my DD’s enduring POA, re sale of his home, and I cant express that as not attorney, but I’ve certainly realised I need to specify this clearly in my expression of wishes.. So, my expression of wishes will get amended and I don’t need to re register it legally. It is a working document in effect.

do both LPOA at same time. My health LPOA also states that my DSs must consult with one of my female relatives (no DD) to ensure they get a female perspective, but also cos these female relatives are in nhs clinical positions so can give my DSs (who are in late 20s) extra support to make their decisions.

think about that, the health LPOA does mean making some difficult decisions sometimes so make sure , if possible, your attorneys do get a wider perspective .

also, imho, never have one single attorney, always jointly and severely. Particularly for health
and particularly if no legal partner
do not place all responsibility into one persons hands. To be frank it’s not fair on them either. My DFs attorney, set up under enduring POA old rules, is having a hard time taking responsibility for all his needs and we can’t help take that load or share that burden of decision making, he’s the one who has had to make decisions on nursing homes, deal with all the funding issues etc etc. . On the other hand he isn’t best one with managing savings and investments - he’s never had much money of his own. Even his understanding of tax efficiency is vague, whereas myself and the other siblings) are much more clued up financially. It can be very frustrating for us when attorney isn’t making DF savings work for him

If you can search for my threads I had some great advice. I finally got the forms sent off in July and I'm still waiting for confirmation that they are active or whatever the phrase is. I've had acknowledgment of the OPG receiving the forms but nothing further and that was about 6 weeks ago.
Good luck with it all. I had an absolute nightmare with my siblings and extended family over it and in the end it's just me and a very close family friend who are attorneys. My siblings behaved terribly over it.
There are lots of details in it that my parent wanted to make sure was documented but it's not necessary to go into details if you want to keep it simple. It was very easy to do once my siblings were out if the picture. They made it into a complete circus nightmare.
Thank you for this thread because you've prompted me to chase them up.

I've checked and it's still on checking despite being submitted early July!