Power of attorney unlawfully spending money?!

badmemory

We were told only to leave enough money at the care home to pay for "stuff" such as her hairdresser for the next week & if there wasn't enough for some reason they paid & asked for it back. It is very unfair to put temptation in anyone's way especially when you may have a dementia driven kleptomaniac around.

Shelldean

badmemory wrote: »

We were told only to leave enough money at the care home to pay for "stuff" such as her hairdresser for the next week & if there wasn't enough for some reason they paid & asked for it back. It is very unfair to put temptation in anyone's way especially when you may have a dementia driven kleptomaniac around.

Yes OH did this for things like her hairdresser.

weston800

Hi all,
I'm the OP and wanted to provide an update, also to ask for any guidance on where I go from here.
We finally received 6 years of bank statements from both of Nan's banks and I've gone through every page with a fine toothed-comb. There has been £6,000 in cash withdrawals and hundreds of transactions to much the same as my initial post so I gathered all my evidence and sent copies along with a letter of complaint to the COP. I have been replied to by several different people; I'll copy some of the emails below. It looks as though they are unwilling to look into my complaint of the clear misuse of the deputies spending my Nan's money and I cannot for the life of me figure out why?!
I think one email is suggesting that because my Nan has now passed away and therefore, the deputyship and POA has ended, they can't help me? But I wasn't able to complain when she was still with us as I had no control over her finances. 
Some replies:
Thank you for your email dated 12 March 2020. We are unable to investigate your concerns now, even if the OPG had jurisdiction covering the period of your concerns.

 Unfortunately, the OPG does not have any retrospective jurisdiction and therefore, I can only direct you to my previous email.

 I regret that I have been unable to provide you with the information sought, but I hope that I have been able to explain why this is the case.
---

Thank you for your email and for the information you have provided. When a client passes away, the deputyship comes to an end and our jurisdiction over the deputies also ends at that point.  We will of course look at the information you have provided and the concerns you have raised. However, please note that as you are a third party, we are limited to what information we can provide to you.

 If you have a specific request for information, you should email our Information Assurance team directly at OPGInformationAssurance@publicguardian.gov.uk for them to consider your request.

-

I write further to your email dated 11 March 2020.  I apologise if I have not been clear. If you think that theft has taken place, then by all means you should report this to the police.

 I will be reviewing the information you have provided in due course and may need to contact the deputies for clarification and further information to enable me to complete my review.

 If you wanted to request the outcome of the review, you should send an email requesting this to the Information Assurance team of which I have previously provided the email address.

Our jurisdiction has ended but if you have evidence to show that funds have been misspent, you have up to 2 years from the end of the deputyship to apply to the Court of Protection to have the security bond called in.  The security bond is similar to insurance. Deputies usually have to take this out as a condition of the Court Order. Please see this link from the Gov.uk website for further information https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/public-guardian-practice-note-surety-bonds

Thanks

Em

Savvy_Sue

It looks as if your two options are reporting this to the police, and calling in the bond. It's true that if you'd been able to complain while your nan was alive, they'd have looked into it, but they can't once she has died. 

xylophone

I'm the OP and wanted to provide an update, also to ask for any guidance on where I go from here.

The responses received (below) seem clear about what you can do?

I write further to your email dated 11 March 2020.  I apologise if I have not been clear. If you think that theft has taken place, then by all means you should report this to the police.

 I will be reviewing the information you have provided in due course and may need to contact the deputies for clarification and further information to enable me to complete my review.

 If you wanted to request the outcome of the review, you should send an email requesting this to the Information Assurance team of which I have previously provided the email address.

Our jurisdiction has ended but if you have evidence to show that funds have been misspent, you have up to 2 years from the end of the deputyship to apply to the Court of Protection to have the security bond called in.  The security bond is similar to insurance. Deputies usually have to take this out as a condition of the Court Order. Please see this link from the Gov.uk website for further information https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/public-guardian-practice-note-surety-bonds

Has the review taken place and if so have you requested the outcome?

frayedknot

The OPG's reluctance to get involved may be down to them being underfunded and lacking resources to investigate what they may feel is a relatively small discrepancy. I do find their attitude poor considering that this happened on their watch, not after death. Did you visit your nan, did she seem well-clothed or her hair well-coiffered? After she died did you get her clothes from the home?

From my own experience, people with dementia lose all interest in dressing well and rarely demand new clothes. My aunt was in a home and her clothes bill was only about £300 per annum, and she already had a huge amount of clothes. The home provided most toiletries (soap, shampoo etc) and I can't remember her ever asking us to buy her anything, and anything we did buy her would be lost by the next visit. How much were the deputies claiming they spent on her?

weston800

Savvy_Sue said:

It looks as if your two options are reporting this to the police, and calling in the bond. It's true that if you'd been able to complain while your nan was alive, they'd have looked into it, but they can't once she has died. 

I think you're right and I guess I will now have to report this to the police but I'm holding off on doing this until COVID-19 has settled down. As for calling in the bond, I'm not sure how I do this; in a reply email from OPG is says to contact The Court of Protection with reference to the bond but it also says "if you have evidence to prove the money was misspent" - I don't have evidence as such but the bank statements make it clearly obvious to me. Thank you for your help.

xylophone said:

I'm the OP and wanted to provide an update, also to ask for any guidance on where I go from here.

The responses received (below) seem clear about what you can do?

Has the review taken place and if so have you requested the outcome?

The review has taken place and the outcome was in an email I posted earlier - copied below:
Thank you for your email dated 12 March 2020. We are unable to investigate your concerns now, even if the OPG had jurisdiction covering the period of your concerns.

 Unfortunately, the OPG does not have any retrospective jurisdiction and therefore, I can only direct you to my previous email.

 I regret that I have been unable to provide you with the information sought, but I hope that I have been able to explain why this is the case.

frayedknot said:

The OPG's reluctance to get involved may be down to them being underfunded and lacking resources to investigate what they may feel is a relatively small discrepancy. I do find their attitude poor considering that this happened on their watch, not after death. Did you visit your nan, did she seem well-clothed or her hair well-coiffered? After she died did you get her clothes from the home?

From my own experience, people with dementia lose all interest in dressing well and rarely demand new clothes. My aunt was in a home and her clothes bill was only about £300 per annum, and she already had a huge amount of clothes. The home provided most toiletries (soap, shampoo etc) and I can't remember her ever asking us to buy her anything, and anything we did buy her would be lost by the next visit. How much were the deputies claiming they spent on her?

It's a shame if they'd class this as a relatively small discrepancy; there is at least 10k of what I would class as 'unnecessary spending' and the 6k of cash withdrawals cannot be traced. 
My nan was non-vocal and bed-bound for the last 1-2 years (this is when most of the spending took place) - her clothes were standard, she had no desire to dress or look a certain way. She lost a lot of weight so I completely agree that she'd need new clothes and I can see transactions to 'Fifty Plus' which would make sense but then most of the clothes spending was at JD Williams which I think is a chain of online shops but one of them is Jacamo and my male cousin (one of the deputies) is a very tall/very big guy. 
No, we didn't get any of her clothes from the care home sadly - my cousins cleared her room out before we had a chance. The gave my Mum a painting that my Nan had done years before, that's all! Naturally I'm just not happy with how this is affecting my Mum and I'm not the sort of person to just give up when I am given a less than hopeful answer.
I'm not sure how much the deputies claimed they spent on her, I think I need to get hold of the annual reports that they had to file to the COP/OPG but I don't know how or if I'm even allowed to have copies of these.

When my nan was first in a care home, my cousins became deputies/POA pretty much instantly and they hardly touched her bank account for the first 2 years but as she got worse (years 3 and 4) they appear to have rinsed her dry.

tooldle

Just a thought, was Nan in the habit of gifting? Some of the spends maybe xmas and birthday. I always bank transfer for these occasions and clearly mark as “birthday for xx” etc, so that anyone reviewing the accounts is left in no doubt. Is the £6k spend for the entire duration of the stay? Edited to add that i budget for approx £2-2.5k a year for my mum. Hairdresser, chiropodist, toiletries, sweets, flowers, magazines, newspapers, taxi, clothes, shoes, coats, undies, tights, nightwear, birthdays and xmas all add up and that is before adding fun money into the equation. 

weston800

tooldle said:

Just a thought, was Nan in the habit of gifting? Some of the spends maybe xmas and birthday. I always bank transfer for these occasions and clearly mark as “birthday for xx” etc, so that anyone reviewing the accounts is left in no doubt. Is the £6k spend for the entire duration of the stay? Edited to add that i budget for approx £2-2.5k a year for my mum. Hairdresser, chiropodist, toiletries, sweets, flowers, magazines, newspapers, taxi, clothes, shoes, coats, undies, tights, nightwear, birthdays and xmas all add up and that is before adding fun money into the equation. 

Hi, before she became ill; no she wasn't in the habit of gifting and I don't recall this changing during the last 4 years of her life in the care home. There are no bank transactions made to family members. There is a chance that the deputies withdrew cash to gift to themselves for birthdays etc but the cash withdrawal transactions range from £50 to £300 - my nan would only ever gift £10 for any one occasion. 
The £6k I mentioned was cash withdrawals alone, most of this during the last 2 years of her life when she was non-vocal and non-mobile. There are hundreds of other transactions; there are 28 transactions in one day to JD Williams, hundreds spent at John Lewis, transactions to pet shops and gaming shops and also several transactions per day to the local Co-Op which just happens to be over the road from where the deputies live and also where one of the deputies works! 
The first 2 years of transactions are minimal and I would say are pretty much legit for what my nan would need to live comfortably in the care home but the last 2 years of transactions are just ridiculous. 

xylophone

Then this applies?

If you think that theft has taken place, then by all means you should report this to the police.
Our jurisdiction has ended but if you have evidence to show that funds have been misspent, you have up to 2 years from the end of the deputyship to apply to the Court of Protection to have the security bond called in.  The security bond is similar to insurance. Deputies usually have to take this out as a condition of the Court Order. Please see this link from the Gov.uk website for further information https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/public-guardian-practice-note-surety-bonds

Are you prepared to approach the Police?