Lasting Powers of Attorney can
make all the difference to your peace of mind if you are elderly as you may find
it impossible to make your own decisions at some point in the future. When you
have a Lasting Power of Attorney in place, you can rest assured that your
appointed Attorneys will be able to make the decisions needed or take any
appropriate actions on your behalf.
What Is A Lasting Power Of Attorney?
A Lasting Power of Attorney is an official legal document that details the Attorneys
you have chosen to act on your behalf if you should lose capacity at any point
in the future. It is priceless for individuals who lose the capacity to make
decisions for themselves, perhaps due to dementia or severe mental health
conditions.
Your Lasting Power of Attorney can ensure decisions about your financial
arrangements and any health or social care arrangements are made. You can only
prepare it while you have the capacity to do so, but it is put into action when
you have lost the capacity to make reliable decisions on your own, or even if
you no longer want to make these decisions yourself.
Types Of Lasting Power Of Attorney
There are two types of Lasting
Powers of Attorney – Property & Affairs and Health & Welfare. If you
only want to set up a Lasting Power of Attorney to cover all your financial
arrangements, this can be put in place. But most people set up a Lasting Power
of Attorney to cover both, the Property & Affairs and Health & Affairs
to give them complete peace of mind.
You can also stipulate the sorts of decisions you want your Attorney to make on
your behalf or opt for all decisions to be taken by your Attorney.
Whilst you can prepare a Lasting Power of Attorney yourself, you will need a
Certificate Provider to confirm that they are happy you understand what you are
doing and that you are not being forced into doing so. This can be someone you
know well or a professional who may levy a charge.
However, as there are strict rules dictating the order in which the Lasting Powers of Attorney have to be signed. Using an external Certificate provider can often mean that the whole process can take longer than you anticipate. Also, if the document is signed in the wrong order, the application can be rejected, meaning an extra Court fee and extra delay.
The Lasting Power of Attorney will
need to be registered with the Office of the Public Guardian for it to be
valid. This process can take up to 3 months and should be done at the time of
preparing the documents, although it does not need to be.
As part of the process, I am able to offer free home visits, at evenings or
weekends and I can also act as Certificate Provider all within the fixed fee.
I am a professional Will writer based in Leicester with over 18 years’
experience in this area of law. Get in touch today for a friendly, sensitive
service that offers free home visits and weekend and evening appointments to
make the process as easy as possible for you or your loved one.
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