When can my attorneys act for me?

At which point your attorneys can start to make decisions for you depends on the choice you have made for this in your LPAs. Your LPAs must be registered before your attorneys can start acting for you. It is important you know when attorneys can act for you.

Please also keep in mind that attorneys can only make decisions about your health and welfare after you have lost mental capacity to make these decisions for yourself. You can also choose this option for your property and finance decisions. The more popular option is to choose that attorneys can make decisions for you as soon as your property and finance LPA has been registered.

If you have only named one attorney, they will make decisions alone.

If you have named more than one attorney in your LPA, you have three options for choosing how you want them to make decisions for you. However you appoint your attorneys, they must always act in your best interests.

Jointly and severally

You can appoint attorneys jointly and severally to make decisions with or without each other. This is useful if one of your attorneys is unwell, busy with work or goes on holiday. As the most flexible option, it is also the most popular choice. This also means that if one of your attorneys can no longer make decisions for you on a permanent basis, then your LPA will still work. Any decision made by an attorney is treated as if all attorneys had made that decision.

Jointly

You can appoint attorneys jointly, to make every decision together, no matter how simple. Because all attorneys must agree, this can cause delays to making decisions. It may be that an attorney is not available immediately due to work or family commitments. If the attorneys can’t agree, then depending on the importance of the decision, they may need to go to court so that a decision can be made. With jointly appointed attorneys, if one of them dies or can no longer act, then your LPA comes to an end. Your LPA will no longer work, unless you have named at least one replacement attorney to step in. You would then need to make a new one, as long as you have the mental capacity to do so.

Jointly for some decisions, jointly and severally for other decisions

Attorneys appointed in this way can make decisions on their own but also together, depending on the wording you have used in your LPA. This is a more complex way of appointing attorneys. We recommend that you seek legal advice before making this type of LPA. If the wording is unclear or conflicts with other provisions in your LPA, then it will not work.