Guide to Power of Attorney for Idiots please

[superstar63]

Is there somewhere I can find all that I need to do this for my husband and myself for both health and finance, it all sounds very confusing and I want to make things easier for my children before anything happens to either of us before it is too late and we have lost competency?

Thanks

Are you in England & Wales or Scotland?
It's different in each place.

https://www.gov.uk/power-of-attorney
You can do it with a solicitor but that costs £££ as long as you take you time and follow all the steps as requested it’s actually quite straightforward. The PoA office are helpful - if you make a mistake they write and explain what to do to rectify it.

You can't do that in Scotland. There's no template.

Thank you for the link and I will have a look at it and we are in UK

Where in the UK? As explained above, there are different rules.

This is for England. Not for Scotland or NI. I don’t know about Wales

The forms are downloadable from the link @Autumcolors gave, along with guidance notes which are very helpful, telling you the implications of your choices and what you might not be able to do if you make this choice. Try downloading the paper form and filling it in just as a practice, reading the guidance notes as you go.

Basically, it’s simple. You choose up to 4 attorneys who can act for you, in your best interests but according to your wishes, if you lose your marbles. And one or more replacement attorneys. So you could appoint DH and DC1, with DC2 as a replacement in case DH goes before you.

Then you decide whether they act jointly - they all have to get together and sign for everything however trivial - or jointly and severally, in which case if one of them is buying toothpaste for you, they don’t have to get the other’s agreement.

The PoA for Health can be used only when you’ve lost capacity. You can decided whether the Finance one is the same or whether it can be used earlier - useful if you still can manage things but are fed up with the paperwork.

Once you decided on this and filled in the forms (and the guidance tells you precisely what order things can be signed in and who can witness), you submit it all to the OPG, and once it’s been returned and stamped by them, it’s ready for use when needed.

@Autumcolors
@MereDintofPandiculation

Thank you, I meant to say I was in England.

In that case, Mere's instructions should do the trick. The forms are huge, and some of then instructions could be clearer, but if you go slowly and read everything twice it's not actually too bad.

I've just done the UK Gov one. Although the forms run to 22 pages when printed out, there are only really a very few questions to answer.

You don’t need a solicitor but you need someone to say you have capacity-our neighbour signed mine.

Thanks and I have had a quick look through and it seems quite complex so will print it all and look in depth.

One question though, can one witness sign one attorneys signature in one location and another one sign another in a different part of the country or do all attorneys and myself have to be witnessed all at the same time by the same witness?

Thanks

The witness has to be physically present at the signing, you can’t witness via Zoom.

They don’t all have to be signed at the same time, but get the order right.

You can have a different witness for each signature.

@MereDintofPandiculation Sorry but what do you mean by get the order right?

It tells you in the guidance notes. It’s actually straightforward as it’s the same order as in the form. So make sure a date of signature on a later page isn’t earlier than a date of signature on a previous page. And dont forget the extra signature on p6 in the health and welfare one.

https://qlaw.co.uk/power-of-attorney/how-to-sign-a-lasting-power-of-attorney-lpa/

I got info online for my husband and myself only need a solicitor or medic to declare capacity, ours did it for free.
We are in Scotland and did it through the Falkirk guardianship office cost £83 each. Costs increase in April.
We typed up a will got our sons to sign the power of attorney forms.
There is a backlog so could be months before you receive it in writing but once it's sent it is in effect when they receive, hope this helps.

We did ours (both types) during the first lockdown.
We downloaded the forms and filled them in ourselves, with our added wishes in the Health and Welfare one.

It’s quite straightforward but you do need to read the instructions very carefully, particularly IIRC as regards witnesses and signing/dating. Any mistake means that it will be rejected and you’ll have to start (and pay!) again.

There is a backlog so could be months before you receive it in writing but once it's sent it is in effect when they receive, hope this helps. On-line advice suggests this is not true in England. Everything says it is in effect “once it’s registered” “once you have the letter with the on-line key”

We downloaded the forms and filled them in ourselves, with our added wishes in the Health and Welfare one. You can also attach a Letter of Wishes. Not legally binding, but our nursing home took it very seriously.

I did this last year for my elderly parents. It was simple- the forms are long and might look daunting at first glance, but actually ask for very little information, aside from the names and addresses of attorneys and witnesses. But as a previous poster said, read the instructions carefully and get the order of the signatures right.
A solicitor had quoted them nigh on a £1000 to do it for them, which I thought was outrageous.