To think parents have caused a family rift with their LPA

[sapphicy]

My parents set up LPAs for financial and medical recently, it was agreed all 3 siblings will act jointly and we were all happy with this.

Long story short my sister is not actually a financial attorney, just medical, and was misled by parents. No idea why they did this. She had debt issues many moons ago but is a police officer now and owns her house outright. Perhaps parents thought she wouldn’t agree to act for medical if she wasn’t also financial, or they had a change of heart after she signed.

The problem is they didn’t tell her. For months she’s been asking us all why she’s had notification letters for medical but not financial, and instead of just telling her the truth my parents told her ‘these things take time’ and it’s been pretty awkward for me as I realised from letters I’ve received that financial has already been registered.

Sister then went directly to the OPG (at her own cost) and found out she is not in fact a financial attorney as she was led to believe. But she swears she signed 4 forms like I did.

Since she’s found this out she is not speaking to any of us, her husband contacted me to say she is severely depressed at the minute over this, we’ve all lied to her, she can’t trust her own family any more, feels like she’s lost us, etc.

I relayed this to parents who won’t talk about it or even explain what has actually happened. I can’t think of a good reason not to be honest with her about this from the start. It’s obviously not an error or a misunderstanding either as parents haven’t said ‘no that isn’t right’.

What do I even do here, AIBU to tell my parents this is their problem to sort out and I won’t be playing mediator? We’ve never had a family fall out like this before. I respect parents right to make decisions, but this isn’t really sitting right with me and I can understand why my sister is pissed off.

It’s between your parents and sister.

I don’t think this is for you to deal with.

That is really crap of your parents. I would really try and talk this out with your sister, explain you had no clue and that you don’t want it to impact on your relationship

This is between your parents and your sister. All you can do is make clear to your sisters DH that you were unaware.

@sapphicy wow that's a heavy load to carry but it's not yours so pass it back and leave them to it.

You can still run any decisions made by your sister if the time comes.

Agree with pps - you don't have to do anything except convince your poor sister that you were unaware. That may well take longer than you want though, sadly.

I understand why she's hurt and it seems, on the face of it, a rather cruel thing to do on your parents' part.

Yeah I think this is why I’m laid here upset about it in the middle of the night, it could have been a total non issue, but my parents have handled it in such a way that they’ve potentially destroyed my sisters relationship with the entire family, for no obvious reason

I think although it is between your parents and your sister you’ve put yourself into it as well. You knew that financial one was registered but kept quiet when your sister was asking. You didn’t press parents to explain the situation to her. So I can see why she’s upset with you as well and imo you owe her an apology.
When my mum treats my sister unfairly I tell mum how it looks. It’s up to mum what to do about it but I don’t keep quiet.

added: I think your parents and your sister have different relationship than yours. And she clearly suspected something that's why she went online.

I would say "I thought we all had the same responsibility, this had nothing to do with me. I love and trust you as I always have. I dont know why they have done this but please know that I dont agree with it at all."

Sorry you’re going through this. I wonder if there is something more to this than you are aware? There has to be. You said your sister previously had debt issues - did your parents loan/give herr money before that you and your other sibling don’t know about perhaps?

Do this. Leave the message with her husband if necessary so she at least isn't left feeling her whole family joined forces against her and then lied about it.

Unless she went via a dodgy solicitor who essentially conned her, I’m not sure how she incurred any cost by going to OPG as there is no charge for searching the register to check an LPA.
Also her reaction and the wider family dynamics would really cast doubt over how workable these LPAs are going to be. You need to be able to make decisions together and in consultation with one another, if needs be. Lots of frank and transparent family conversations need to happen now if you want to avoid a much bigger headache (and heartache) further down the line. Even if it means your parents have to cancel their LPAs and make new ones in light of whatever they (and their attorneys) feel is for the best. It’s such a huge responsibility and not one to be taken lightly.

It’s really not though? OP is fundamentally part of this as she is named on both LPAs and will be the decision-maker if needed, whereas her sister has been excluded and may well decide to cause havoc if she really is as cut up about it as she says. False allegations of financial abuse or mismanagement are quite common in these sorts of family disputes unfortunately. OP has an opportunity to nip it in the bud now by addressing it

Interesting, I looked at it briefly and seemed to need the reference number to check (which I’m assuming she wouldn’t have for the financial if she never received any info about it?) so assumed she’d ordered a copy from the OPG. Does that incur a charge?

This is my fear, hearing that she is depressed over this there are quite clearly some strong feelings and if she’s still no contact at the point we have to start making decisions and also with her being a police officer and having being lied to once already, she might want a level of transparency that is going to make it not worth the hassle of not including her. I’m wondering whether to step down myself if they can’t sort this mess out.

I can’t honestly remember the ins and outs of it but she got into a mess with money at uni about 20 years ago and couldn’t pay her rent and parents had to bail her out. She is now a police officer and has paid her mortgage off so presumably she’s financially stable now

I had a similar situation with my brother. I helped my father write his will. Everything was to be divided equally between us but I and as alternate my DH were named trustees of the testamentary trust, my brother was understandably very surprised and upset and felt my father and I had conspired behind his back. I ended up writing my brother an email telling him exactly how it came about and laying the blame squarely at my father’s feet (he had promised me he would explain and okay it with brother before signing). I hesitated because I knew it would hurt my brother a lot to learn essentially that my father didn’t trust him, but trying to cover it up was affecting our relationship. Thankfully he took it well and our relationship is stronger than ever as we agreed to stop playing piggy in the middle with our parents, who can be quite manipulative. We now always communicate directly.

TBH it is never really a good idea to have multiple LPA’s as all parties have to agree on the course of action if anything happens which can delay things/cause rifts in itself.

It sounds like your parents knew their decision would upset her and hoped to ‘get away with it’ until it was too late. Their actions, their consequences.

One of my parents made a will that caused a rift after they passed. In hindsight that parent should have told us what they’d done, not left me to distribute the will to disgruntled people.

Obviously your sister is deeply upset because your parents have treated her differently and she feels less-than and singled out. In practice, her name not being on those documents won't matter because I'm sure you'll all work together and make joint decisions in your parents best interests if it ever becomes necessary.

But this isn't about whether she gets to sign forms or not in 10 years time. It's about her feeling not trusted trusted by your parents. This is what she needs to talk to your parents about. Not the LPOA.

I’d tell her she dodged a bullet. Being an active power of attorney for finance and property is an absolutely THANKLESS stressful task and she’s incredibly lucky she has two siblings who will carry this burden. I’d be skipping off into the sunset wild with delight if I had managed to avoid this horrendous responsibility. I am LPA for two people and am several years in. It is awful.

Whether they are right or wrong to trust her with financial decisions is irrelevant, the problem is their cowardice and deceit. Only they are going to be able to sort this one out. For it to invoke such a strong back story with your sister it would not surprise me if there isn’t more of a backstory from her perspective re how she is viewed/treated by your parents.

Medical and Financial LPAs have to be separate.

I think that pp meant multiple people being awarded the POA.