Power of Attorney (financial) - what are the benefits?

[FruHagen]

So I am struggling to explain with real world examples to my elderly Mother (who we think has early stage dementia) the reason for her giving Power of Attorney (financial) to me and my 3 siblings.

I just can't come up with any compelling examples for her to understand what it is and why it's necessary. I have told her it means that people she loves and trusts can speak to financial institutions like the bank etc on her behalf but she just says "why the hell would I want you to talk to the bank for me. I'm not ga-ga"

Can you lovely people enlighten my poor imagination with some examples of why this matters?

I've just done this on line today for my healthy mum, once it's done it's done. All the reasons stated. It does say on the form that whilst they are of sound mind all decisions are still hers (but could do practical things for them ) my FIL left it too late to do one for my MIL before her dementia progressed. Was ok but they could have been in a tricky situation (more for joint assets)

Have you had conversations about her wishes if she does face limited mobility/stroke? Is there a relative you can hold as an example?

DH had fortunately got a POA in place for MIL before she started having strokes and couldn't sign any more even though she still had full mental capacity at that stage. It would have been a nightmare all round without the POA.

DH and I have just turned 60 and have had ours in place for each other, with our young adult DD as a reserve.

@FruHagen

Also *@Candleabra* I fear this is about to happen to us

Many good wishes to you

I would try and stress the difficulty it will cause YOU without POA. I'm sure your Mum wouldn't want to cause you any more pain. I do so wish I had more aggressively pushed her signing the form. We were all reeling from the dementia diagnosis and mum never came to terms with it. She lost capacity quickly, but there was a window when she would have been legally able to do it. (But obviously still very altered from her normal self unfortunately - that's the problem).

My parents are quite young, so we've been very unlucky. It was hard enough lacking poa whilst my dad was alive but since he died it's been a nightmare. I've spent a fortune on legal fees, and although the Deputyship application has now been submitted I'm still no further on in real terms. Court of protection cases take ages, but even longer due to covid. It could take up to a year for them the process the case. We owe the council thousands and thousands of pounds in care fees. The house is standing empty and I can't do anything with it, but I am still responsible for maintenance and upkeep (out of my own pocket). Everyone I explain the situation to says it's ridiculous and 'surely there's something else you can do'.
There isn't.
Please try and get the POA.

Do you have one? If not then lead by example. I did mine at the same time as I completed mum's, I've told my son that when travel restrictions are lifted I'm having a gap year up the Amazon. My mother's "what if" list applied equally to me too and if I trust my son why doesn't she trust me? The issue was that she didn't see a need for it - why wouldn't the banks talk to me, after all, I'm her daughter. If I thought it was worthwhile doing for me and I wasn't worried about it then there wasn't any reason for her to be concerned.

The paperwork was really straightforward and you can do it yourself, I found it difficult because of mum's early dementia. She understood what it was about but couldn't remember ever looking at it before. Every time we discussed it was for the first time, she'd agreed all the wording but when I printed it off it was new and the six week gap until it came back was plenty of time for her to have forgotten signing it. I'd looked at doing it about ten years earlier and I regret not cracking on with it then, the longer you leave it the worse it will be.

Hi all.

I put forward the reasoning to my Mum you all gave me, and she agrees to having a PoA setup but she doesn't want her friend to be the Certificate Provider as she thinks that signals there is something wrong with her.

So it's the Certificate Provider we have an issue with. Does anyone know who else can do this role other than a friend? Is there a way to do a LPA without one?

Does she go to church? Vicar? What about a neighbour who knows her well but is discreet? It doesn't have to be a friend.
Anyone who has known the Donor for at least two years before the date when the Certificate Provider signed and confirmed the Donor’s capacity. This can be a friend, neighbour, colleague, or former colleague of the Donor. It must be someone who is more than an acquaintance, who can have an honest conversation with the Donor about what it means to create an LPA. This can be one of the persons who Witnessed the LPA.
It can also be a health care professional.
Incidentally it's very easy to do yourself, no need to pay for a solicitor to do it.

Her GP might be a good person.

You need a Certificate provider, as you need someone to say that they are happy to have a POA. Otherwise you could have children forcing their parents to sign away their financial control

@FruHagen

Hi all.

I put forward the reasoning to my Mum you all gave me, and she agrees to having a PoA setup but she doesn't want her friend to be the Certificate Provider as she thinks that signals there is something wrong with her.

So it's the Certificate Provider we have an issue with. Does anyone know who else can do this role other than a friend? Is there a way to do a LPA without one?

Quote OP: she thinks that signals there is something wrong with her.' Just tell her it doesn't mean that, it just shows she is making sensible provision for possible future eventualities. A friend is an ideal choice or it could be one of your friends if your Mother knows and trusts them.

Googled and found: 'The certificate provider must be someone you know well or a professional person such as a doctor, social worker or solicitor. The LPA must be registered with the Office of the Public Guardian before it can be used. There's a fee of £82 to register your LPA.'

I've got LPAs set up for me for goodness sake and I'm in my 50s and there's not wrong with me - ditto my OH.
Ditto in fact my 3 elderly relatives for who I'm an attorney - 70s & 80s but all still living independently, driving, full marble count (a few physical issues but frankly that's true of me to a lesser extent!).

*nowt wrong
Blooming auto correct

God, my mothers life would have been hell over the last few years if she hadn’t had POA over my grandparents affairs.
We already have them in place for her and my dad - have done for years.
Me and my husband are planning to put them in place for each other in the next few months. We’re only 40!
You can predict the future.
Keep at it til it’s done!

You ‘can’t’ predict the future!!

My parents had them put in place at vast expense, not that they have to be vastly expensive; the ‘advisor’ saw them coming. My dad, the instigator of this, is dead, my mum is housebound and clueless and to be honest I don’t know how to activate this? Both me and (useless) sibling are named. Can someone explain to me in simple steps how I make this live for me?

@Zolrets

My parents had them put in place at vast expense, not that they have to be vastly expensive; the ‘advisor’ saw them coming. My dad, the instigator of this, is dead, my mum is housebound and clueless and to be honest I don’t know how to activate this? Both me and (useless) sibling are named. Can someone explain to me in simple steps how I make this live for me?

If you are named in the LPOA I think you should have had a letter from the solicitor who set them up to say they'd been registered. Did you not receive any paperwork at all?

What sensible advice on this thread with live examples of WHY it needs to be done. I have one for my Mum and Dad. Dad is in a care home and his finances were a horrible mess. He had money, he just didnt know where it all was! I have been able to sort this out whilst he is still with us and not when he passes.

I would hate to have found the mess he left behind at that time.

Parents are divorced many years ago and what I would say is that generally old people will have their own ways of doing things. Writing cheques for example when its easy to just use online banking (neither of them had this or the internet). My Mum loves me ordering for her online and she then checks her paper bank statement when it comes in.

You only have to search this forum to see that older people get themselves in a real mess and for all sorts of reasons keep it hidden eg: house in a terrible mess, hoarding issues, house too big for them but they cannot face moving and where would all their 'stuff' go?

Having done the POA's myself they are rather fiddly. Hence the reason solicitors have got in on them but I found listing out on a sheet of A4 what everyone is eg donor = elderly Father, and the order that the forms need to be filled in really helped. In these CV19 days getting signatures was challenging.

The CP is often the bit people get confused about and it can be a friend, neighbour who knows you for 2 years. It doesnt need to be a GP, MP or a magistrate or such nonsense.

Take your time with it and we persuaded my FIL to get one by saying its just there just in case. Otherwise things carry on as normal for him. Sadly my DH has a life limiting illness and we have applied for one too.

Deputyship is £££ and takes ages and often the person passes on before its all done

@Zolrets Find the PoA document - your mother should have it, if not, then the advisor who helped her draw it up, but they may not give it you without her permission. If it has been registered, it should have the Office of Public Guardian stamp on every page - the original will have this in raised pinpricks. A competent advisor should have at least raised the possibility of it being registered as soon as it was drawn up, so that it's "ready to go".

If it has been registered, then it's a simple matter of showing a copy to every financial every institution you deal with. Easier in branch - they'll just photocopy it and put it on file. Some places will accept scanned copies, others will want a certified copy posted to them. The Post Office offer a document verification service at £12.75 for 3 documents - I've used this for bank id documents but not for a PoA. You don't have to send it to every institution your parents deal with, only the ones which you want to deal with you.

Alternatively, check with the OPG to see if it's been registered: www.gov.uk/find-someones-attorney-deputy-or-guardian

If it hasn't been registered, you first have to send it in to the Office of Public Guardian to be registered, This costs I think £82, and is taking a couple of months at the moment.

Worth reading it carefully when you find it, to see if it has been drawn up so that it can be used while she still has capacity (this applied to Financial PoA only) - in which case you can help her with things that she could manage but which would cause her stress - or whetehr it can be used only once she's lost capacity. Also whether decisions are to be made"jointly and severally" in which case either you or sibling can act on her behalf, or whetehr it's "jointly" only, in which case you both have to sign off every decision - which protects your mother from dishonesty on either of your parts, but is a nightmare in practical terms.

Writing cheques for example when its easy to just use online banking I dispute whether it's easier to do on-line banking when you're older. Even without any sign of dementia, memory declines, and typing in long streams of numbers is more difficult. Even worse before they brought in the account name checking. Add in possible arthritis making typing more difficult, and slower with the possibility of being timed-out, and a cheque is easier by far.

Mere. Having found uncashed cheques in my DF home from over 20 years ago from a couple of accidents he had in his car.. It might be easier to write a cheque from their point of view but its far more difficult to work out what has happened to them and whether they were ever cashed going back so far in time.

So you can pay the bills if they can’t eg if in hospital or loose capacity to do so ( can choose to enact only if lost capacity )

The issue is she needs to do the POA then it is held for I think 12 weeks and she has not not loose capacity in that time .....

The alternative is bleak and what’s more costs lots of money via court of protection deputy ship to get access to her funds when she has lost capacity AND she won’t have any say in who the court appoints as her deputy.

Put the worst case scenario to her and see what she thinks.

You certainly aren’t “allowed to help with financial matters until she regains capacity “ as someone up threat said - well unless they mean you pay the bills till she pays you back.

NB all the things oldies do financially to allow others access to finances are actually not ok and are things the account holder has said Ed to say they won’t do eg giving the card and pin so you can pop and get cash for them from the cash point or go to Sainsbury’s etc. Or getting internet banking that their daughter actually manages. We’re there to be any allegation of fraud the bank would not be interested in any losses etc

Thanks for the advice. I do have paper work and I will check for the signs that it is registered. This was some sort of ‘deal’ with an ‘advisor’ (not a solicitor) my late father got for will/poa/changing the house to tenants in common.

The main benefit is cost, court of protection will cost £££ whereas the PoA will cost around £250 or £500 with legal help.

The main issue is speed. PoA makes this easier and faster

Can you take the form to a Solictors to get them to be the Certificate Provider?

I have a friend who manages her parents bank accounts using their log in and PINs. Fine but I have told her many times what happens if she spots an issue and say her DH is in hospital unable to deal with anything.

She says she would rush down to the bank and demand answers. There is no POA. I told her they won’t discuss anything with her. She thinks they will, she can prove who she is etc. I also said you could be a child who is up to no good.

Some people just won’t be told.

@FruHagen

Hi all.

I put forward the reasoning to my Mum you all gave me, and she agrees to having a PoA setup but she doesn't want her friend to be the Certificate Provider as she thinks that signals there is something wrong with her.

So it's the Certificate Provider we have an issue with. Does anyone know who else can do this role other than a friend? Is there a way to do a LPA without one?

It has to be someone who knows her. You cannot do a LPA without one. You can ask her GP, but they most likely will charge you. Or a solicitor, but again they will charge you a lot!

In the meantime, if you ask her to phone her bank whilst you’re with her, she can have your name added to the list of contacts they can speak to on her behalf. Most utility providers also accept this, as does the GP. We did this with my MIL before her POA came through.