Mum signed attorney forms years ago and nobody ever registered them. Now the bank will not talk to me. Is it too late?

#1Lorna B.(Joined Feb 2026 · 8 posts)June 16, 2026, 9:12 pm

I thought this was the one piece of paperwork we had actually done. Turns out we had done half of it.

About six years ago, after my dad died, my mother sat down with my sister and filled in the forms naming the two of us. I remember it happening. I remember the neighbour coming round to witness something. And then, as far as I can tell, the forms went into the sideboard drawer, because that is where I found them on Sunday, in the original envelope, with a compliments slip from the solicitor and nothing else. No letter back. No stamp on them. Nothing saying they had been sent anywhere.

Since the readmission her memory has got noticeably worse and last week the bank declined to discuss a direct debit with me because, quite rightly I suppose, I am nobody as far as they are concerned. I took the forms in on Tuesday and the woman looked at them for a long time and said she could not accept them as they were and I should "get them registered", and when I asked how, she did not know.

So what I am asking is, are those forms worth anything at all now, or did we miss the window? She signed them when she was completely herself. She is not completely herself now, though she is a long way from not knowing what a bank is. I am in England. I would be grateful for the plain version because I have read three websites tonight and they all assume I know what they are talking about.

#2ron-at-home(Joined Aug 2025 · 17 posts)June 17, 2026, 7:40 am

Ours sat in a drawer for four years too, so you are in good company. Different country and the rules here are state by state, but the thing I learned is that a signed and witnessed document and a document somebody will actually act on are two different objects, and nobody tells you that at the signing.

Get the plain version from Maura, she will know the English mechanics better than I do.

#3Maura KinsellaAdmin(Joined Sep 2024 · 168 posts)June 17, 2026, 11:05 am

Lorna, the short answer first, because you have earned it: no, you very probably have not missed the window, and the reason is exactly the thing you said at the end. She signed them when she was completely herself. That is the moment the law cares about. What you are missing is a second step, and the second step can still be taken now.

The mechanism. In England and Wales a lasting power of attorney is made when it is signed and witnessed, but it cannot be used until it has been registered with the Office of the Public Guardian, and those are two separate events. A signed, unregistered document sitting in a sideboard is a valid instrument that is not yet an authority, which is precisely why the bank could not act on it and also why the bank was not wrong. Registration can be applied for by the person who made it or by the attorneys named in it, and the part that matters for you is that the attorneys can apply to register it even after the person's memory has declined, provided the document itself was validly made at the time. The Office of the Public Guardian publishes its current processing time and it is measured in weeks rather than days, so the useful thing to do this week is start rather than wait for a good moment.

Two things to check before you send anything, because they change the route.

First, the date. If those forms were made after October 2007 they are lasting powers of attorney, and there are two kinds: property and financial affairs, which is the one the bank needs, and health and welfare, which is a separate document that covers care and treatment decisions. Look at the top of each form and see which you have. Quite a lot of families discover they did the money one and never did the health one, and that matters later. If the forms are older than that, they are an enduring power of attorney, which is a different instrument: it covers money and property only, never health, and it gets registered at the point the person is becoming unable to manage their affairs, with certain relatives notified first. Your six years ago puts you in lasting territory, but check.

Second, whether it was completed properly. There is a certificate provider section, confirming she understood what she was signing and was not under pressure, and there are witness signatures in a particular order. The solicitor's compliments slip is a good sign that somebody competent prepared it. If anything turns out to be missing and she no longer has capacity to make a new one, the fallback is an application to the Court of Protection for deputyship, which is slower, costs more and is supervised more closely, so it is worth knowing that route exists without assuming you will need it.

And the bit that answers your last worry. "Not completely herself" is not a legal category. The Mental Capacity Act presumes capacity, assesses it decision by decision, and does not treat somebody as lacking it merely because a decision looks unwise. Somebody can have a poor memory and still be perfectly able to understand a direct debit or to register their own document. If she can, she can be part of this rather than have it done around her. If she cannot, the attorneys register it. Either way, it moves.

The shape is the same in every system on this site, even where the names change. In the United States a durable power of attorney is usually effective when signed, with no central register in most states, but every bank has its own checks and its own forms, as the American members here can tell you. In Australia and Canada the instruments are state, territory and provincial, and some require registration before they can be used for property. Ireland's newer arrangements register through a national decision support service. The question that works everywhere is: is this document made, is it registered where it needs to be, and does it cover the decision I am trying to make.

I have written the long version in power of attorney and decisions, including why this is the one piece of paper on the site that gets harder every month it is left. And put the compliments slip, the date you posted the registration, and the reference number you get back in the care file, because the next time an office tells you nothing has been received you will want to be able to say when and by whom.

#4K. McAllister(Joined Nov 2025 · 11 posts)June 18, 2026, 3:30 pm

Adding the American version since Maura mentioned it, because we had the same envelope moment and a different problem.

Ours was valid the day it was signed. No registering anything. What I had not understood is that valid and accepted are not the same word. My mother's bank wanted their own form, filled in by her, in a branch, and it took three visits to find a morning when she was well enough to do it, and the third one was only because a manager who had met her before happened to be in. A different bank across the street had no such requirement. It is the institution, not the law, that decides whether the piece of paper works on a Tuesday.

Two practical things from that. Ring every account holder now, while she can still sit in a branch, and ask what THEY need to see. And take the original plus a certified copy, because one branch wanted to keep a copy and I nearly handed over the only one.

#5dee1972(Joined Apr 2025 · 24 posts)June 19, 2026, 8:02 am

The health one. Please check for the health one.

We had the money one registered and in force for two years and nobody, including me, had noticed that it gave me no say whatsoever in anything to do with her care. Found out in a meeting about her discharge. Not the moment to discover it.

#6Lorna B.(Joined Feb 2026 · 8 posts)July 8, 2026, 8:15 pm

Three weeks on. Both forms are lasting ones, both are the property and financial type, and there is no health one at all, so Dee was right and I have gone slightly cold about it.

Rang the solicitor's office from the compliments slip. They still exist, they had a copy on file, and the woman who answered said "oh, they were never sent off" in the tone of somebody who has said it before. We have applied to register the money ones, my sister and I, with the fee paid on the fourteenth and a reference number in the folder. Nothing back yet and I was told not to expect anything quickly.

The health one is the harder question and I have not resolved it. She was assessed for something else last week and was, on the day, entirely herself, so I have asked the surgery whether she could make a new one now and been told to ask the solicitor, who has told me to ask the surgery. I am going round again on Monday. If anybody has done the health one late, with someone whose good days are still good, I would like to hear how.