Lasting Power of Attorney for property and financial affairs

By CareFinder Team · Published 2026-09-22 · Last reviewed 2026-09-22

A lasting power of attorney for property and financial affairs lets you appoint people you trust to manage your money, bills, pension, savings and home. In England and Wales the document must be registered with the Office of the Public Guardian before anyone can use it, and once registered it can be used with your permission even while you still have mental capacity. Scotland and Northern Ireland use different documents.

A lasting power of attorney (LPA) for property and financial affairs is the document that lets someone you choose deal with your money when you cannot do it yourself. In England and Wales it has no legal force until the Office of the Public Guardian (OPG) has registered it, and it is the only one of the two LPAs that can be used while you still have mental capacity, if you allow that. Scotland and Northern Ireland do the same job with different paperwork, so the nation the person lives in decides which document they need.

It is also the paperwork that most often holds families up when a parent moves into care: without it, nobody can pay the fees out of the parent's own account.

What does a property and financial affairs LPA cover?

An attorney under this LPA can handle money and property matters on your behalf, within any limits you set. In practice that usually means:

• running your bank, building society and savings accounts
• paying bills, rent, mortgage payments and care home fees
• claiming, receiving and managing your pension and benefits
• dealing with HMRC and filing your tax return
• selling, buying, letting or remortgaging your home and other property
• managing investments, ISAs and premium bonds
• dealing with a council financial assessment for care

It does not cover health or personal decisions. Where you live, what treatment you have, and how you are cared for day to day belong to a separate health and welfare LPA, which most people make at the same time. GOV.UK sets out both types and you can make one, the other or both.

Preferences and instructions

The form lets you add preferences (wishes your attorneys should bear in mind) and instructions (rules they must follow). Instructions are binding, and a tightly worded one can tie your attorneys' hands years later - an instruction to consult a named person before selling the house is no help once that person has died. Keep instructions few and workable, and put the rest in as preferences.

When can your attorney start using it?

When you make the LPA you choose one of two options:

• As soon as it is registered, with your permission. Your attorneys can help while you are still making your own decisions.
• Only when you no longer have mental capacity to make the decision yourself.

Most people choose the first. It lets an attorney pay bills while you are in hospital, without anyone having to prove anything about your mind. You keep making your own decisions for as long as you are able; the attorney is simply allowed to act with your agreement.

The second option sounds safer but tends to cause delay. A bank asked to act on it will want evidence that capacity has gone, usually a professional assessment, at exactly the moment a family is under pressure. Capacity is also decision-specific in law: someone may be able to decide what to buy at the shops but not whether to sell a house.

Who should you appoint, and how should they act together?

An attorney must be 18 or over. For a property and financial affairs LPA they must also not be bankrupt or subject to a debt relief order, and if an attorney becomes bankrupt later their appointment ends. Those rules come from the Mental Capacity Act 2005, which also sets out how joint appointments work.

If you appoint more than one attorney, you choose how they act:

• Jointly - every attorney must agree and sign everything.
• Jointly and severally - any one of them can act alone.
• Jointly for some decisions, jointly and severally for others - for example, all must agree to sell the house, but any one can pay a bill.

If the form does not say, the law treats the appointment as joint. That matters more than it sounds: with a joint appointment, if one attorney dies or can no longer act, the whole appointment can fail unless you named replacement attorneys. Most families choose jointly and severally for practicality, sometimes with a joint requirement for selling property.

Two other people appear on the form. A certificate provider signs to confirm that you understand what you are doing and are not being pressured: either someone who has known you personally for at least two years, or a professional such as a solicitor or GP. You may also list up to five people to notify, who are told when registration is applied for and get three weeks to raise concerns with the OPG.

How do you make and register one in England and Wales?

1. Decide who your attorneys and replacements are, how they should act together, and whether they may act before you lose capacity.
2. Complete the forms, either through the GOV.UK online service or on the paper form LP1F.
3. Sign in the right order: you first, then the certificate provider, then the attorneys, each signature witnessed. Signing out of order is the commonest reason an LPA is rejected.
4. Tell anyone you listed as a person to notify. They have three weeks to object.
5. Apply to register and pay the fee. Registration costs £92 per LPA at the time of writing, with a reduction or exemption if the donor is on a low income or certain means-tested benefits - check the current figure on GOV.UK before you pay.
6. Wait. GOV.UK says registration takes 8 to 10 weeks if there are no mistakes in the application. Nobody can use the LPA before it is registered.
7. Once the registration letter arrives, set up the online "Use an LPA" account so your attorneys can give banks a code to view the document, and consider ordering certified copies for organisations that still want paper.

You can do all of this yourself. A solicitor is usually worth the cost if there is a business, property abroad, a second marriage, a trust, or any real chance of family disagreement.

What are the rules in Scotland and Northern Ireland?

Scotland

Scotland uses a continuing power of attorney for money and property, and a separate welfare power of attorney for personal decisions, usually written into a single document. It must be certified by a solicitor or a doctor and registered with the Office of the Public Guardian (Scotland) before it can be used. As in England, you choose whether the continuing powers start as soon as it is registered or only if you lose capacity. mygov.scot explains the Scottish process, including the registration fee and when it can be waived.

Northern Ireland

Northern Ireland still uses an enduring power of attorney (EPA), which covers money and property only - there is no health and welfare equivalent. An EPA does not have to be registered straight away. The attorney applies to register it with the Office of Care and Protection at the High Court when they believe the donor is becoming unable to manage their own affairs. nidirect sets out how this works.

Wales

Wales uses the same LPA system as England, through the same Office of the Public Guardian.

A document made for one nation is not automatically the right one somewhere else. If your relative is moving permanently from, say, Glasgow to Manchester, take advice on whether a new document is needed.

What can your attorney do with the money, and what is off limits?

An attorney must act in your best interests, follow your instructions, keep your money and property separate from their own unless you already share an account, keep records of what they spend, and never use the position for their own gain. They cannot let someone else exercise the powers for them, and cannot act at all before the LPA is registered.

Gifts are the area where well-meaning attorneys most often go wrong. GOV.UK's guidance for property and financial affairs attorneys allows gifts to friends, family or acquaintances on the occasions when the donor would normally give one - birthdays, weddings, anniversaries - and donations to a charity the donor would not object to, provided the donor can afford it. Anything larger needs the Court of Protection's permission first, including paying school or university fees, interest-free loans, and letting someone live in the donor's property below market rent. "Inheritance tax planning" gifts made by an attorney without the court's approval are a frequent cause of OPG investigations.

An attorney also cannot make or change your will, and their authority ends the moment you die, when your executors take over.

If anyone is worried about how an attorney is behaving, the OPG can investigate, and the Court of Protection can remove an attorney and appoint a deputy instead.

How does the LPA get used once care fees start?

This is where most families first need the document, and it helps to know the practical steps.

• Proving authority. Banks, councils and care homes each want to see the LPA. The quickest route is the GOV.UK online service, where your attorney generates a time-limited code that lets an organisation view the registered LPA; otherwise you need a certified copy. Give banks a few weeks - their power of attorney teams are slow.
• Signing the care home contract. Read the notice period, the fee review clause and what happens to fees after a death before signing, and sign clearly as attorney, not in your own name.
• The council's financial assessment. An attorney can request it and supply the bank statements and pension details it needs.
• The house. An attorney can let or sell the property to fund fees, and can sign a deferred payment agreement with the council.
• Top-up fees. If the council asks anyone to pay a top-up above the rate it will fund, get in writing who is expected to pay it before you agree. Paying a top-up out of the resident's own money is not usually how the arrangement is meant to work.

If capacity has already gone and there is no LPA, this route is closed: the family has to apply to the Court of Protection to be appointed as a deputy, which is slower and more expensive.

This article is general information, not advice on your own situation. Where there is a business, property abroad, a disputed family, or a large sum at stake, pay a solicitor for an hour of their time.

Frequently asked questions

Can we still make an LPA after a dementia diagnosis?

Often yes. A diagnosis does not by itself mean someone lacks capacity; what matters is whether they can understand the decision to appoint an attorney, weigh it up and communicate their choice at the time they sign. For anyone with a diagnosis it is sensible to ask a GP or a solicitor to act as certificate provider, and to do it sooner rather than later.

Does being an attorney make me responsible for the care home bill?

No. An attorney pays care fees out of the donor's money, not their own, and signs the contract in their capacity as attorney. Read any care home agreement carefully before signing, because some contracts ask a relative to sign separately as a personal guarantor - that is a different and much bigger commitment, and you do not have to agree to it.

Can I make an LPA without a solicitor?

Yes. The OPG's online service and its paper forms are designed to be completed by the person making the LPA, and the registration fee is the same either way. Use a solicitor if the finances are complicated, or if anyone might later argue the donor did not understand what they signed.

What if a bank refuses to accept the LPA?

Go to the bank's power of attorney team rather than a branch counter, and offer the online access code or a certified copy. If the LPA says attorneys must act jointly, every attorney has to be registered on the account. If the bank still will not act, use its complaints process and then the Financial Ombudsman Service.

What happens to the LPA when the donor dies?

It ends immediately. The attorney's authority stops at the date of death, the executors named in the will take over, and the OPG should be sent a copy of the death certificate. An attorney who keeps paying bills from the account after a death is acting without authority, however helpful the intention.

Key takeaways

• A property and financial affairs LPA covers money, property, pensions, benefits, tax and care fees - not health or where someone lives.
• In England and Wales it cannot be used until the OPG registers it, which GOV.UK says takes 8 to 10 weeks when the forms are correct.
• Unlike a health and welfare LPA, it can be used with the donor's permission while they still have capacity, which is usually the more practical choice.
• Appoint attorneys jointly and severally, and name replacements, unless you have a clear reason not to.
• Scotland uses a continuing power of attorney registered with OPG Scotland; Northern Ireland uses an enduring power of attorney registered with the Office of Care and Protection only when capacity is failing.
• Attorneys must keep the money separate, keep records, and get Court of Protection approval before making anything beyond customary gifts.
• Once capacity is lost it is too late: the only route left is a Court of Protection deputyship.