Debt by another family member

superM

I hope you can advise. 

My mother in law has dementia. She was living at her other daughters house previously.  The other son in law was the appointee and all he was receiving Attendance allowance and pension credit etc. 

Unfortunately they treated her not in a good way. She has been loving with us know since last Sept. .

All the benefits etc has been transferred over but it took long time with DWP. 

We now received 2 bills for Water £250 and Gas/Electric £1900 for her previous address. 

The other daughter or son in law has out these two accounts in her name without her knowing. She is mentally not fit so wouldn't able to check letters etc. She is 80 years old. All worked on trust but unfortunately it failed. 

I asked my sister to talk with them but they have refused to make any payments against it. 

What should I do? 

Thanks 

Keep_pedalling

That is fraud. Do you have power of attorney or deputyship for her?

Brie

Water companies, in my opinion, seem to be more understanding in these sort of matters and might write off the bill.  

Gas & electric are more difficult.  Either way, contact them, and assuming they are willing to talk to you, advise them of the fraud that has taken place and that the bills won't be paid under the circumstances.  Ask to talk to their vulnerable customers team and see if they will insist.  If you ring them you might want to do so suppressing your number so they don't have an easy way to contact you again.  Putting anything in writing and sending by snail mail will be best if the conversation needs to continue.  Slow but that's their problem.  


What you need to think about is what will happen if the bills aren't paid.  They aren't going to arrest your MiL for non payment of bills.  They might send nasty letters, threatening ones in fact.  Escalating threats of legal action, court etc.  But even if it was your MiL's debt they would have a very hard time collecting it.  Eventually they may revert back to "the occupant" of the other property (SiL & BiL) and tell them to pay.  

Does she have the ££ to pay?  You could, possibly, advise them that she will pay £1 a month and let them stew on that.  But only if you want to be nice to them.  

If you don't have PoA or similar you might try to get her to sign a letter of authority granting you permission to discuss things on her behalf.  Depending on the level of dementia she might be considered well enough to do this.  Some people do better in the morning rather than later in the day (commonly known as sundowning)

elsien

You haven’t said whether your mother-in-law has capacity around her finances  because a dementia diagnosis doesn’t automatically mean that she doesn’t.
You may well find that without a power of attorney you will have difficulty getting anyone to talk to you. 

So what is her current understanding of the bills and was she aware they were in her name? Playing Devil’s Advocate, it may be something that she agreed to to contribute towards household finances at the time that she moved in.