Daughter wins £127k claim for caring for mum at home

[SerendipityJane]

Interesting ...

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cr93zp78g580o

It was illegal, specifically taking the money directly from the account after the mother had died. However, people often colloquially use the term illegal to be synonymous with some/all of: criminally illegal, should result in prison, should be punished - and there are many illegal and/or morally wrong things which are none of the above, this being one of them, the court has ruled.

In this instance the lady was criminally prosecuted for fraud but found not guilty - obviously only the jury know exactly why but given there doesn't seem to be much dispute that she did take the money it seems likely they weren't certain to the criminal standard that there was sufficient dishonesty or intent for personal gain which is a key part of the criminal definition of fraud, i.e. they most likely thought that she genuinely and reasonably believed she was entitled to the money (or least they thought there was a substantial chance of it). In the civil court judgement which you can read in full and see the full reasoning, the judge absolutely did not endorse her actions in taking the money. In fact he confirmed that was illegal in the civil sense. But the money wasn't recoverable civilly, as the judge ruled that if she had done the right thing by negotiating with her siblings and/or going to court, she would have been entitled to the money.

I know it's hard to get your head around, but there's plenty of situations where someone is found to have acted illegally but they aren't 'punished' in any way civilly, and may even 'win' their case and be awarded additional money. Examples are in family law, it's not uncommon for people to land grab money in joint accounts or joint assets without the consent of the joint owner, technically not allowed but if they end up getting that money in the eventual settlement they can keep what they took. Or lots of employment situations can result in findings the law has been broken but no compensation or punishment necessarily flows (it can but doesn't always).

Ha!

When my husband died, a relative who couldn't attend the funeral asked that a letter to DH be read out at the service.

I had to tell them to revise the letter. It was full of fulsome praise for DH and referenced his battle to recover after a specific operation. Unfortunately, they'd named the wrong operation - which they might have got right if they'd actually visited him when he was in hospital. (They'd been scheduled to visit, but cancelled since there was 'no point' seeing him in hospital.)

In order to take money out of her account, Bern had access to it.

I think it shows he hadn't a clue about the level of care his mother required on the amount of pressure his sister and bil must have been immense.

I think it’s well worth reading the judgement before commenting on this case.

It’s a very sad story in the main of a once close knit family that’s now been utterly broken as a result of poor communication/assumptions and crucially a lack of transparency in expectations.

I’m not sure anyone in the family (ie siblings) comes out of this without being subject to reasonable criticism about how this dispute could have been avoided (and what must be a substantial loss to the estate in legal fees).

Whilst I’m very much in favour of care providers being financially compensated my concern is that some people may read the headlines an infer a right to a level of restitution for caring that simply doesn’t exist and crucially take money from a person/estate to which they are not legally entitled.

All said and done, it’s a lesson in having open conversations and a documented agreement in place that sets out care expectations and financial compensation in advance of taking on such responsibilities.

Forgive my ignorance but, shitty siblings aside, is it
normal for children to be paid substantial sums for providing care? How do you calculate how much to ‘charge’? Everyone saying it was half the price of actual carers - why is that? Surely if we’re agreeing a daughter can be paid for the care it should be at market rate?

Strikes me as a good loophole for getting rid of some funds in later life by exaggerating care etc and then shifting £100k out of your accounts…!

Most families probably don't charge the estate because the care is split more equally and they benefit equally from the savings in the estate anyway.

However in this case its a BIG family 6 or 7 of them one daughter took on the caring, pretty much alone, nobody even seemed to come forward even to give her and DH some respite.

Her efforts saved the estate a fortune, but at cost to her and her DDs
Unless she charged the estate for her energy and effort the tax man would probably muscle in and whats left would be divided by all the siblings.

So she'd only see a small fraction of the savings she gave to the estate.

I guess you'd need to be able to prove the savings made to the estate.

It's not very common I don't think, and contrary to the reporting of the case in some media, I don't think it will massively set a precedent for future cases. This case was unusual in that there was explicit, written evidence that the mother and siblings wanted to reminburse the lady for the care she was providing. I think it's more common for a sibling who's providing care to be left a greater share in the will, and perhaps claim attendance allowance or carers allowance to help with day to day costs, although obviously both those solutions come with problems too...

That being said, if you read the full judgement on Bailii which explains how the judge reached his conclusion on how much was reasonable, and you see the detail of how much this poor lady needed in terms of care, the 'deal' the siblings could have reached of their own accord to pay their sister something in the region of £150,000 (which she broadly calculated as £135 per day for 900 days of care plus some incidentals), for which the mother got room, board and 24/7 care from clearly very dedicated relatives, looks pretty sensible/reasonable. You couldn't source a full time professional live-in carer for less than that (plus the mother would have had to buy her own food and drink, pay bills etc on top) and tbh it sounds like for the last year of her life at least she would have been beyond what one carer could cope with and would have needed a care home which is much more expensive - £1k per week plus. The mother very easily could have racked up 200k + in care bills over that 2.5 years. So looking at it that way £150k for 24/7 highly dedicated care is a bargain.

But these things are really hard to calculate reasonableness of as it's so individual to different circumstances, which is really why this family and others in their position should have had these conversations upfront and documented them and their rationale - as you say while it's not inherently unreasonable to pay out quite substantial sums for care, where that's going to a family member HMRC may be interested in whether these were gifts or genuine payments for services. There's the fact the mother moved into the daughter's home, which on the one hand is obviously a big commitment but on the other hand more convenient for the daughter, and how much is reasonable for the mother to pay for room/board/household contribution. Then there's the fact that at first anyway the care wasn't a full time job, the daughter and her DH were certainly limited in their opportunities for other work and to enjoy their retirements and hobbies etc but they weren't literally caring for her 24/7. And then you get into how much the daughter would have been doing for her mum anyway even if not her official/ paid carer, and how much the other siblings would have stepped up and offered a cheaper alternative, the eldest brother gets very short shrift from the judge and didn't even know what health conditions his mum had, but several of the other siblings clearly were close and were much more involved, one lived very close and might have supported if she'd lived at home with carers, one offered to have the mum live with her for £100 p/week, now who knows, quite possibly those plans were totally unrealistic and would never have transpired, who knows. But the point is it's not easy retrospectively to try and decide.so not advisable to do so really!

I think until you have seen up close people with dementia you will never really understand it.

I think she couldn't really be left by the time she moved in, the reason she was moved was a neighbour had found her wandering confused in the street.
Once people get to that stage, they are unsafe to leave, its like leaving a small child, you just wouldn't.

When my father needed care in the months before he died I was very grateful that I was an only child. This allowed me to spend some of his money, which was coming to me anyway as I was the sole beneficiary of his estate, on paying for 24 hour care. This kept him safe and well cared for and gave me peace of mind as well as allowing me to be his daughter and not his nurse. It would have been awful to have had to argue with a sibling who opposed me as I was depleting the inheritance.

@MyCatChloe

I'm also an only child. My parents coped with my input (I visited every day after work ) and extra care from carers.

When Dad died, I used her money to increase the care in her own home until I could finish organising accessible accommodation for her with us. (She rented.)

DH was compo mentis, but had an ischaemic stroke so couldn't help Mum with meals (and obviously couldn't do personal care). When Mum moved in with us I used her money to pay for extra care during working hours, but did all the night time care.

The daytime care used up all Mum's Attendance Allowance and the majority of her savings, but it was worth it: she lived another four years after Dad died and lived with us for over two.

I think the DD and SIL did amazing, inc nursing care.
Helped by SIL being a retired GP.

All the way through there is discussion that they should be paid but no discussion on how much.
They eventually calculated it at £150 as day or £6.25 an hour, inc care and living costs and still cheaper than carers or a home would have been.

That was the bit that jumped out to me, too!

Unbelievable.

So that woman is dealing with her mums dementia and physical issues, including a severe prolapse, round the clock for 2 and half years….and this numpty who’s doing what sounds like the grand sum of nothing, thinks payment of £50 a week is fair?

I genuinely wonder if he will ever realise or admit how preposterous that is.

I haven’t read the judgment.

But an executor’s role isn’t to decide what’s fair. It’s to discharge debts of the estate.

“I’ll do it for £50 a week in keep” “OK”. His duty is to calculate that and pay it out.

”I’ll do it for £50/hr” “OK”. Same principle. Pay it out.

Do you want your executor going back over your life and deciding where you should have paid for things you didn’t (or should have paid more), then paying that over? That would be ripe for abuse.

What a gem the brother sounds. Imagine being married to it! I wonder who will care for him later in life...

It does happen, even without a POA, it happened in my family because the person concerned said they were the executor. It was stopped, but it would have resulted in money leaving the account

In terms of the outcome, clearly she gave up her life to care for her mum, as you might expect. I dont think the repetitive 'the courts found in her favour' is helpful, we know courts sometimes make good decisions and sometimes they make wrong decisions.

I dont have a view in this case but I notice people on this site are very keen to emphasise that courts are right when they agree with the decision!!

We know that sometimes judges get it wrong.

He was on the other side of the Atlantic and hadn't a bloody clue.
Note he also claimed not to know until they were in court Mother was doubly incontinent, diabetic, cataracts and various other issues.

The other siblings should have got him told to behave himself.

The only mistake she made was not to put a price on her care costs until near death.

The court ruled that a contract was in place to provide care and therefore deferred payment could be taken. The daughter had PoA and therefore was entrusted with paying debtors, including herself, from her mother’s account. Debts can be discharged before probate is granted and this appears to have been a legal debt.

he wasnt the brother on the other side of the atlantic, he lived nearer than that but seems to have been on holiday alot.

There are many times that they discussed the amount of care - in fact one of the sisters was paid £350 for looking after her mum for a weekend, so Id assume that sets a precident for an amount - plus there were discussions with others re the cost of carers and care homes. The mother was adamant she didnt want to go in a home, and the time she did for respite when no one was around she deteriorated badly, and they ALL agreed that it would be the end of her.

Bern was a shared executor but Andrew seemed to hold the purse strings. Bern appeared to have access to the general Lloyds current account for her day to day needs.

Andrew seemed very dogmatic and ordering the closest brother to be doing jobs to ensure the house didnt deteriorate in the mothers abscence, there is one point when shaun suggests he do it himself. There are several times when stuff needs sorting but he puts it off as he is going on holiday for a month or 6 weeks.

He seems very forgetful about stuff, despite apparently recording it in his little black book, which he refuses to present to court. the judge suggests that the reason may be because it proves that they DID discuss a figure of £150K which he now denies, as he also denies telling her to 'just take it'

He also asks why she emptied the savings account into the current account, even though there are records of them discussing and agreeing to that much earlier in the year.

He claims that Lloyds are going to investigate her for fraud and implys he is giving her a chance to repay the money, wheras it would appear this is not the case, and that he asked them to prosecute. She was subseqwuently found not guilty.

I hope the brother and siblings read this thread, they have absolutely no fucking idea what a strain this has put on Bern, physically and mentally, and it would have cost them far more had she been in care. They should think themselves lucky the greedy bastards.

Actually when you read the whole court case.
It was accepted that she should be paid for caring. He told her to put the invoice in and take the money prior to the estate going to probate.

They just hadn't discussed a sum, £150 per day for 2.5 years was her calculation.

Thats when he spat the dummy out, he was thinking £50 a week.

The other siblings knew the situation, especially Maryann who was physically closest. Bern included their days of caring on the invoice, at the same rates. As the other siblings had stepped up to get them get some holiday time

I wonder if the other siblings and Bern are now trying to remove him as executor before he spends any more

Agree. The story raises a lot of questions on both sides. Noone comes out of it looking great.

You need to read the judgment that is linked to up thread.

There is absolutely no doubt that the Mother didn't want Bern to be out of pocket and she should be compensated for providing care.

The only fault is nobody actually put a figure on the care element.
The siblings were happy to pay professional carers but Bern respected her mothers wishes and did it herself.

Even couple of carers for a couple of hours a day would have been £100, £25 an hour x 2 people x 2 hours,
£25 an hour by the time you pay min wage, travel time & costs allowance for holiday pay, allowance for employers NI, employers OH. Actually £25 per man hour is probably low.

Berns and her DH did 24hrs a day for 2.5 years, including dealing with various medical issues, dealing with double incontinence, having a retired GP on hand the mother was given the best of care

@QueenMaikercould I ask you, if you were a child at the time, whether you felt that your mum chose your nan over you, and your childhood?