Why make a Property and Financial Affairs LPA?
Property and Financial Affairs (P/F) LPAs can be used while you have mental capacity for decision making. For example, if you had to go into hospital for a reason unrelated to mental capacity, you could ask your attorneys to manage correspondence or go to the bank on your behalf.
If you lost mental capacity to make your own financial and property decisions and did not have an LPA, your family would not have an automatic authority to deal with your correspondence, make payments on your behalf, or sell your property. Their only option would be to apply for a deputyship order through the Court of Protection which is timely and more expensive than creating an LPA. The deputyship process can take several months, during which time no one has legal permission to manage your finances or meet your financial obligations.
Quite often people who are thinking of creating a P/F LPA worry that their attorneys will take over their finances or amend their will. So, it is important to remember that by registering a P/F LPA you are not losing any right to make your own decisions, and that your attorneys can only act under your instruction while you have mental capacity. You must also remember that your attorneys cannot amend your will in any way and have no automatic right to read your will. You can give them specific permission to read your will within the power of your LPA.