Lasting Powers of Attorney Guidance Alex Truesdale Wills In Cobham Surrey

Personal Lasting Powers of Attorney (LPA’s)

Lasting Powers of Attorney: appointing Attorneys to act in your best interests and to make decisions on your behalf, when you have lost the ability to do so yourself.

Alex Truesdale Wills Limited: A professional Will writing and estate planning service based in Cobham and serving clients throughout Greater London including Teddington, Weybridge, Richmond, Twickenham and the South coast of England.

Call: 07887 946557 to discuss any queries you have regarding Lasting Powers of Attorney, your Will or for any estate planning needs.

Personal Lasting Powers of Attorney

Lasting Powers of Attorney: appointing Attorneys to make decisions on your behalf, when you have lost the ability to do so yourself.

Call: 07887 946557 to discuss any queries you have regarding Lasting Powers of Attorney, your Will or for any estate planning needs.

Lasting Powers of Attorney (“LPAs”)

While we all hope that we will end our days in full possession of our mental faculties, the reality is that we can lose our ability to make informed decisions through accident, injury or illness. A sobering number of people is affected by head injuries or mental illnesses every year. The number of traumatic brain injury (caused by falls, sporting incidents or road traffic accidents), acquired brain injury (from strokes, heart attacks, brain tumours and brain haemorrhages) and dementia, reinforce the importance of appointing someone to take responsibility for your affairs should you be affected.

Making Lasting Power of Attorneys under the Mental Capacity Act 2005 (MCA 2005) enables you to appoint someone who can manage your legal, financial and health affairs should you lose the ability to do so yourself, whether temporarily or permanently.

Anyone aged 18 or over with the capacity to do so can make an LPA appointing one or more trusted individuals, known as “Attorneys”, to make decisions on their behalf.

An LPA is a powerful document, and an effective insurance policy against your losing mental capacity and the subsequent consequences for your family and finances.

There are two types of Lasting Power of Attorney; a Lasting Power of Attorney for property and financial affairs (“LPAPFA”) for financial decisions and a Lasting Power of Attorney for health and welfare (“LPAHW”) for health and care decisions.

Lasting Power of Attorney for Property and Financial Affairs

A property and financial affairs LPA empowers your Attorneys to make decisions on your behalf about your property and financial affairs at a time when you are no longer able or lack the mental capacity, to make those decisions yourself.

This can include paying your bills, collecting your income and benefits or selling your house, subject to any restrictions or conditions you might have included. It can only be used once it has been registered at the Office of the Public Guardian (OPG).

Lasting Power of Attorney for Health and Welfare

A health and welfare LPA allows your Attorneys to make decisions on your behalf about your personal welfare, for example, where you live and the kind of care you receive. It can empower the Attorneys to give or refuse consent to medical treatment provided this power has been expressly given in the LPA.

If you had already made an Advance Decision to state that you do not wish specified life-sustaining treatment to be given at a future time, a subsequent LPA giving the Attorneys that decision making power will invalidate the Advance Decision, and the Attorneys will have the power to decide whether to refuse such treatment on your behalf. A subsequent Advance Decision (if applicable in the circumstances) would be binding on the Attorneys.

A health and welfare LPA can only be used once registered at the OPG and once you have become mentally incapable of making decisions about your own welfare.

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Protecting Your Best Interests

The process of making an LPA includes nominating a person or persons who must be notified should your Attorney/s wish to activate the LPA by registering it with the OPG.

This means that you have the opportunity to nominate friends and family who, independently of your Attorney/s, can ensure that the LPA is not going to be abused and that you are genuinely able to make a decision at the point in time that registration occurs.

Once an LPA has been registered , if you recover your mental capacity (for example, after an illness) then your Attorney/s must allow you to recommence making decisions for yourself.

Registering your Lasting Powers of Attorney

We recommend that you register your LPAs as soon as they have been executed to ensure that they can be used without delay should the need arise. Our fees for producing your LPAs include supervising the registration process at the OPG.

The OPG charges an administrative fee of £82 per LPA which is payable by you in addition to our professional fees. Depending on your financial circumstances we may be able to apply for a 50% rebate of the OPG’s fee.

In 2022, the OPG have confirmed that they are currently experiencing delays and advise that registration for LPAs is taking at least 20 weeks.

Consequences of Not Having an LPA

If you have no LPA in place, and lose mental capacity, the Court of Protection (“CoP”) may appoint a “Deputy” to make ongoing decisions on your behalf. Applying to be a Deputy can be an expensive and lengthy process. 2022 Court fees include an application fee of £371, a hearing fee of £494, a supervision fee of £320 per annum and a £100 assessment fee if you are a new deputy. Solicitors’ fees for the necessary CoP applications can run into thousands of pounds. It can take many months before a Deputyship order is made, and in the interim, your financial affairs would effectively be frozen – a particular problem if care home fees are being funded privately – and all welfare decisions would rest with your medical team and/or social services.

The CoP will only appoint one Deputy, who may not be the individual you would have chosen.

To hear a heartbreaking, real life story of why you should make LPAs, watch this powerful video from the BBC One Show. Whilst broadcast in 2010 it remains very much relevant today.

Our LPA Service

Contact Alex Truesdale Wills Limited to make your LPAs today. We are currently offering complimentary Advance Decisions and GPAs to every client for whom we are preparing Lasting Powers of Attorney to ensure they are covered to the greatest extent possible during the COVID-extended OPG registration process. Please call 07887 946557 for further details.

Alex Truesdale Wills Limited offers a professional Will drafting and estate planning service covering the Surrey, Kent, Greater London areas, the South Coast of England and Wales.

Call us on 07887 946557 or request a call back here.

ABOUT Alex Truesdale

Client Testimonials

“The support Alex gave me and my husband after our Wills and LPAs were finalised was second to none especially as he was diagnosed with a terminal illness a few months later. This ongoing support, advice and bringing in other specialists to assist was outstanding and I felt that we were in very good hands and would continue to be when the inevitable happened.
After my husband died, the comfort of knowing all was in order with the Wills was a great relief and her help in the immediate aftermath was much appreciated. It wasn’t just the professionalism but the genuine concern for my situation and that of the family. Alex then continued to guide me through the process and through some pretty complicated issues relating to the estate administration. She always responded to my copious emails and phone calls with clarity, efficiency and care.
The whole process was dealt with in a timely manner and to a very high standard and I felt that I was being looked after like one of her own family.
I can’t recommend Alex highly enough – a very talented professional dedicated to her work with a heart of gold.”

JD, July 2020

“Very clear explanation of what the options and implications were for us. It was also good to have someone focused on the end result we had to get to, as it’s very easy on your own to leave to another day.”

EM, September 2018

“I have known Alex Truesdale for over 6 years, during which time she prepared Wills and Lasting Powers of Attorney for my sisters and assisted us in the administration of my sister Elizabeth’s estate after her death in 2018. I testify to her attention to detail, her knowledge and experience in her work and the warmth of her communications whether by letter, by telephone or in person. She responds to us quickly and we have full confidence in what she does on our behalf and on her advice on various aspects. She has a good network of people when particular advice is needed beyond her field of expertise or training. She became a friend to us as a family. I gladly recommend her services to others.”

KH, July 2020

“Thank you again for helping me sort out all our Wills and the funeral plan for my godmother. I cannot believe how timely that was bearing in mind today’s situation. Only good news from her care home so far, but to know that resources are there to help the staff directly if the worst happens certainly gives me peace of mind.”

SC , May 2020

“After many years putting off writing my Will I finally entrusted Alex Truesdale with the task of compiling it for me and my family. My main wish was to pass my estate on to my son, and have guardianship put in place, should the worst happen before he came of age. Alex guided us through the difficult and emotional process with the utmost professionalism and put us at ease from the outset. She was able to address all of the issues we put to her and brought up many we had not considered regarding our estate.
“As we were about to travel abroad, we were also on a very tight schedule for the wills to be drawn up and signed. Alex went above and beyond to make sure everything was in place for us in the allotted time, even to the point of being personally on hand to instruct ourselves and our witnesses during the signing procedure.
“In using Alex Truesdale Wills, we now feel totally secure if the worst should happen our affairs are in order. We will be continuing to draw on her knowledge as and when our wills need updating in the future and are delighted to recommend her first class service.”

BW, May 2018

“Alex arranged an appointment for my husband and I to update our Wills in view of a change in family circumstances. She was organised, efficient and extremely sensitive to our needs. We discussed advance directives and lasting powers of attorney in-depth – things we had only considered in vague terms previously but realised how intelligent it was to sort them out early.
“I cannot fault Alex’s professionalism and caring attitude, and will be recommending her service to my friends and colleagues.”

SM, September 2019

“We would like to thank you for your professional help in getting us to a point of having signed Wills after many years of procrastination. Not only that your advice gave us the impetus to arrange a Civil Partnership and we now feel that we have got at least some of our affairs in order in these worrying times.”

KB, September 2020

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Will Writing And Estate Planning From Alex Truesdale Wills

Alex Truesdale Wills Limited offers a professional and personal Will writing service, giving you flexibility and control for the present and your loved one’s peace of mind about the future.

Contact Alex Truesdale today to arrange a free, no-obligation initial consultation, virtual meetings or face to face.