Lasting Powers of Attorney
A Lasting Power of Attorney (LPA) is a legal document that you can put into place which gives a relative, friend or professional (attorney) the ability to be able to help manage your affairs or deal with your affairs on your behalf when you are no longer able to.
You can create two types of LPA:
Property and Affairs LPA
A Property and Affairs LPA allows you to choose someone to make decisions about how to spend your money and the way your property and affairs are managed.
Health and Welfare LPA
A Health and Welfare LPA allows you to choose someone to make decisions about your healthcare and welfare. This includes decisions to refuse or consent to treatment on your behalf, deciding where you live and end of life care. These decisions can only be taken on your behalf when the LPA is registered and you lack the capacity to make the decisions yourself.
You will not be able to check up on the attorney yourself if you become incapable, so it may be a good idea to appoint more than one person to help prevent abuse of the responsibility and to also consider a replacement Attorney. Choose people you can trust to act in your best interests. You should consider how well they look after their own financial affairs and whether you can trust them to use your money to meet your needs.
Don’t leave it too late, by creating your LPA’s, you could potentially avoid the need for costly and complicated dealings with the Court of Protection.
Contact us if you would like us to help you to set up a Lasting Power of Attorney.
The Court of Protection
The Court of Protection make decisions on financial or welfare matters for people who can’t make decisions at the time they need to be made because they lack mental capacity.
Whilst we would always strongly recommend that you create a Lasting Power of Attorney, sometimes situations arise where this has not been done and in those circumstances, a Deputy will need to be appointed, and we are here to help you.
Our specialist team has extensive experience in handling matters relating to the Court of Protection so telephone to have a free no-obligation chat to see if we can help you.
CALL OUR COURT OF PROTECTION TEAM NOW ON 01782 204000
Alternatively send us a free no obligation enquiry by e-mail.