Power of Attorney - Different Types of Power of Attorney Documents



Posted: Tuesday, March 15, 2011

by Jon Aslin
Clickdocs

There are different types of Power of Attorney in English law. An Ordinary Power of Attorney is created for a particular period of time in situations where the Donor is going abroad or is unable to act for some other reason and wants someone else to have the authority to act on his or her behalf. The Ordinary Power of Attorney will usually cease either at a particular time or on the request of the Donor. An Ordinary Power of Attorney can be general (e.g. to do anything that can legally be done by the Attorney), or relate to a specific act (e.g. to sell property or operate bank accounts).

A Power of Attorney is only valid whilst the Donor has the capacity to confirm the Attorney's actions unless it is made in the form of a Lasting Power of Attorney and registered with the Office of the Public Guardian. This form of Power of Attorney was brought in by the Mental Capacity Act 2005 in October 2007 and replaced the previous Enduring Power of Attorney - although Enduring Powers of Attorney made before the law changed are still valid.

A Lasting Power of Attorney allows individuals to appoint a legally authorised person or persons to make decisions with regard to their health and welfare or financial and property affairs in the event they become incapable of doing so themselves at some point in the future.

Anyone aged 18 or over can make a Lasting Power of Attorney in England if capable of understanding what she or he is doing. No-one, not even close family, can make a Lasting Power of Attorney for somebody else, so it must be done while the Donor is able to express his or her own wishes.

You may appoint a Property and Financial Affairs Attorney to manage your finances while you still have capacity as well as when you lack capacity, if you wish. For example, it might be easier for you to give someone the power to carry out tasks such as paying your bills or collecting your support payments if you have difficulty getting around or if you are abroad a lot. The authority granted to the Attorney in such a situation will continue after you lose capacity. In contrast, a Health and Welfare Attorney can only act when the Donor lacks capacity to make decisions him or herself.

When choosing an Attorney it is important that you are confident that they know what you want and that you are comfortable that they will be making decisions on your behalf. The job of an Attorney is an important one and one that the person you have chosen has to agree to take on. You should ensure that you and they completely understand how they have been appointed to act and what this will mean in practice when they are making decisions on your behalf. To help your Attorney(s) make decisions that are in your best interests in the future, you should talk with them now and make them aware of any particular views or wishes you may have.

If you are looking for  Power of Attorney Forms for use in the UK or any other kind of legal document, you can save time and money by going to Clickdocs Legal Agreements.
Jon Aslin is a director of http://www.clickdocs.co.uk. After studying Engineering at University he spent 15 years in international business in management, technical and comercial positions. For the last 10 years or so he has been involved in online commerce, having teamed up with a lawyer to develop Clickdocs - now a leading supplier of online legal documents and templates to the UK market.
This Article has been viewed 179 times. (Not updated in real-time.)
No comments yet.
We want your comments! If you can read this, you don't have javascript enabled, so you can't use this comment system. Please enable javascript.