Enduring Powers of Attorney (“EPAs”) and Lasting Powers of Attorney (“LPAs”) are essential legal tools, enabling a trusted person to act in your best interests should you lose the capacity to manage your own affairs. They play a crucial role in ensuring your future needs are met.
EPA or LPA?
The EPA was the standard document for dealing with mental incapacity before its replacement by the LPA in 2007. If your EPA was correctly signed before 1 October 2007, rest assured, it should still be valid. This puts you ahead of many who have no arrangements in place at all for managing their affairs if they lose mental capacity. However, replacing an EPA with an LPA is generally advisable.
Reasons to Consider Updating Your EPA
Replacing an EPA with an LPA provides an opportunity to review and update your arrangements. EPAs, now over 17 years old, grant very broad powers to attorneys. Relationships and circumstances may have changed, potentially making previous appointments unsuitable.
For instance, while appointing your children as attorneys may still be appropriate if relations remain on good terms and they are willing to act, it might also be worth considering appointing your spouse alongside your children, or even as a primary attorney. This ensures mutual involvement in decision-making, should the need arise.
The Advantages of LPAs
LPAs offer several benefits over EPAs, providing greater flexibility, readiness, and coverage:
- Flexibility: LPAs enable a more collaborative approach. Attorneys can support your decision-making while you retain capacity and step in fully only if you lose capacity entirely. This adaptability is invaluable in situations where capacity declines gradually.
- Replacement Attorneys: LPAs allow you to name replacement attorneys who can act if your first-named attorneys are no longer able to. This ensures your plans have built-in resilience and longevity.
- Registration Timing: An LPA can be registered with the Office of the Public Guardian immediately, making it ready for use when needed. In contrast, an EPA requires registration only upon the loss of capacity—a process that can delay its usability by two to three months when it’s most urgently required.
- Health and Welfare Decisions: EPAs are limited to property and financial matters, leaving health and welfare decisions unaddressed. An LPA specifically designed for health and welfare can cover crucial decisions about medical treatment, care arrangements, and life-sustaining treatment.
Regular Reviews Are Key
Given the broad powers granted by both EPAs and LPAs, it is essential to periodically review them—at least every five years or following significant life events, such as a death or divorce. This ensures that your arrangements remain appropriate and effective.
Ideally, LPAs should be prepared in consultation with an experienced solicitor or reputable professional to ensure your wishes are clearly articulated and legally robust.
Conclusion
While EPAs remain valid if correctly executed, LPAs offer greater control, flexibility, and comprehensive coverage and allow you to deal with health and welfare decisions. Given any valid EPA is at least now approaching 20 years old, if it has not been reviewed it certainly should be and careful thought should be given to the advantages of the newer LPA system, to ensure your affairs are in the best possible position in the event of a loss of mental capacity.