Power of attorney - mental capacity

Yorkshireman99

This is exactly why both donor and attorney need to agree beforehand. Personally I would be very reluctant to be an attorney.

Keep_pedalling

bouicca21 wrote: »

I'm puzzled about the difference between the old style EPA and the new LPA. I think I should do the financial one as an insurance against the future but I don't want my attorneys to use it until I have lost capacity.

You can no longer do EPAs unless you are in Northern Ireland. LPAs are IMO a much better solution, no one knows when one might be perminantly or temporary incapacitated by something like a stroke or accident, and having a registered LPA in place means your attorneys can step in immediately.

If no POA is in place then the only alternative is the long winded and expensive proces of going through the courts, having an unregistered LPA in place puts an 8 week or longer delay in getting the thing registered, and even then there is the risk that it could be rejected if it had not been completed correctively, so you are back to the courts again.

Ours have been registered for about 5 years now, and each of us has 3 attorneys, each other and our 2 children. If you don't trust your attorneys to not act until appropriate chose different ones.

FreeBear

Yorkshireman99 wrote: »

I wish all banks were as helpful.

As my mother's health deteriorated, I was granted a third party mandate that allowed me to sign her cheques & other bank related forms - This was with Lloyds/TSB and did it over the counter.

Never needed a debit card on the account - If (or rather, when) we went out shopping, invariably used my wallet to pay for stuff.

Keep_pedalling

poppystar wrote: »

I'm hoping I was chosen carefully!!!

Donor did however refuse to discuss detail and left the forms blank - solicitor seemed happy about this although I was not. Donor was 'I'll trust you' … (and, yes, I could see the danger in that but to not agree to being PoA would have meant that a person I wouldn't trust with a pet would have been given the task). Maybe donor was only doing PoA because it was the done thing and never intended to relinquish any control while breath left in body. In contrast the funeral is paid for and micromanaged in every detail.

Family don't shut up easily - I wish! I want to take the line you suggest which is why I was hoping that there would be something that could clearly give me the authority to start using the PoA with no comeback for doing so.

An attorney is only responsible for action they have taken, and it does not allow you to step in just because the donor is acting a bit strangely. If someone starts giving all their money away for instance but are not showing any other signs of serious mental illness there is nothing that can be done.

Margot123

A rule of thumb is that an attorney must always act in the best interests of the donor. I had LPA for my father who had full capacity but ignored overdue utility bills, house insurance renewals etc. I was advised by his solicitor to 'take charge' as he would eventually have been made bankrupt and wouldn't have cared a jot! Thankfully, I was instantly able to redeem an otherwise rapidly deteriorating situation.

Margot123

Keep_pedalling wrote: »

An attorney is only responsible for action they have taken, and it does not allow you to step in just because the donor is acting a bit strangely. If someone starts giving all their money away for instance but are not showing any other signs of serious mental illness there is nothing that can be done.

Actually, inaction would not be advisable if the donor was giving all their money away to their own detriment and creating an inability to financially support themselves. This was the legal advice I was provided with regard to father.

poppystar

Keep_pedalling wrote: »

An attorney is only responsible for action they have taken, and it does not allow you to step in just because the donor is acting a bit strangely. If someone starts giving all their money away for instance but are not showing any other signs of serious mental illness there is nothing that can be done.

Margot123 wrote: »

Actually, inaction would not be advisable if the donor was giving all their money away to their own detriment and creating an inability to financially support themselves. This was the legal advice I was provided with regard to father.

Which is really why I was seeking guidance in the first place. When can an attorney take over without being asked by donor?

Surely someone giving all their money away as in Margot's example or calling emergency ambulances every week for months only to be sent home after 24 hours of tests finding nothing wrong could be said to be beginning to need help? Ditto not eating adequate food etc.

Not wanting to invoke it to save any inheritance from being frittered away or any selfish reasons but simply to ensure the donor has the life they would have previously wanted. I was hoping there was some acid test that could be applied to say someone needed PoA to step in and that protected the butt of attorney from any suggestion they were not acting in donor's best interests.

Margot123

You MUST use your discretion, and act in a way that any reasonable-thinking person would in order to safeguard the individual. You appear overly concerned about repercussions at a later date; this will not happen. By accepting the role, an attorney also accepts the responsibility to make a clear judgement on behalf of an individual of apparent 'sound mind'.
I have been in this exact same situation, and therefore can tell you exactly how it 'works'. You have to deal with what is in front of you, and act quickly. Simple changes now can avoid great distress for the donor at a later date.

badmemory

Anyone who tells you it is easy to jump in and tell a previously financially savvy parent that they are scr***ng up is lying to you. I got my mother out of 2 thankfully small financial disasters, thankfully she felt able to confess to me what she had done, she would never have told my sister. She had a nasty fall which enabled me to use to POA without having to go down the route of actually telling her she wasn't capable. Combined relief & nightmare. In the last year she had gone from contributing to her 2 favourite charities to 11. That to me is how you can tell if your relative is vulnerable. Just track the charities they contribute to. They were taking almost a quarter of her admittedly small income!

badmemory

poppystar wrote: »

Which is really why I was seeking guidance in the first place. When can an attorney take over without being asked by donor?

Surely someone giving all their money away as in Margot's example or calling emergency ambulances every week for months only to be sent home after 24 hours of tests finding nothing wrong could be said to be beginning to need help? Ditto not eating adequate food etc.

Not wanting to invoke it to save any inheritance from being frittered away or any selfish reasons but simply to ensure the donor has the life they would have previously wanted. I was hoping there was some acid test that could be applied to say someone needed PoA to step in and that protected the butt of attorney from any suggestion they were not acting in donor's best interests.

We now have a problem where if a hospital admits that a patient is vulnerable they get stuck in there until they can sort something (bed blocking), which at the moment no-one seems to be financially able to do. So they are in denial.

Until recently the whole neighbourhood knew that one of the neighbours had bad dementia. Things like walking past our houses in his underwear, being aggressive, this apparantly was alright because he'd always been a bit that way inclined. A single parent almost losing her children because they were talking at school about seeing someones bare a***. Even the police were called when he was seen (partly by schoolchildren) waving a gun out of a window. Loaded by the way. What happened? the police took the loaded gun off him & walked away. No further action.

He's gone from here but not actually gone. Before last Xmas he had a bad fall. He went into hospital. They let him out telling his also elderly relatives that he wouldn't last the week so they agreed to take care of him & for that week they had district nurses etc to help care for him. The hospital lied of course just to get him out of there. The relatives are now at the end of their tether almost 10 months later.