I’d be interested to receive your feedback re appointments under an LPA.
When in private practice (and now acting alone) I would consider the starting point for a married couple to be to appoint their spouse solely in the first instance and then children as replacement attorneys. I would always set out the various options however.
Is this most common? Or do you advise your clients to appoint spouse and children jointly and severally. I have a situation where wife has lost capacity and husband is too upset to act. So I’m completing a disclaimer. I wouldn’t need to do this if husband were appointed with daughter jointly and severally.
I will also need to remove wife from husband’s LPA which again, I wouldn’t have needed to do if wife was appointed jointly and severally with daughter.
Is that right -would I have had to notify OPG about these changes in circumstances had the appointment been joint and several?
As long as the donors are comfortable with appointing their children joint and several with each other, I would always opt for this rather than the children being named as replacement attorneys. That way if one of them died or lost capacity, the LPA will not have to be sent to OPG straight away for updating as would be the case if they were replacement attorneys. And of course the children would then have to register it with the bank and provide ID et cetera whereas if they were appointed joint and several they will already have done this when the attorneys first registered the LPA with the bank. However the LPAs and certified copies will still need to be sent to the OPG together with disclaimer/death certificate for updating but there will be no urgency involved. I have found lately that it takes quite a while for the documents to be returned which I suppose is because of the general delay taking place at that office.