You will be able to explain what an LPA does and the steps to make one.
Open your banking app and look at the regular payments going out of your account: rent, card bills, any money you send to family. Then work out who could keep those payments going if you were in hospital and unable to understand or make decisions. In Singapore, unless you have made a Lasting Power of Attorney, nobody has that right automatically.
A Lasting Power of Attorney (LPA) is a legal document made under the Mental Capacity Act and registered with the Office of the Public Guardian. In it you appoint one or more people, called donees, to make decisions for you if you lose mental capacity. A will covers what happens after you die. An LPA covers the time before that, when you are alive but cannot make decisions for yourself.
An LPA covers two areas, and you can grant either one or both. Personal welfare covers your care and daily life, such as where you live, who looks after you and who you see. Property and affairs covers your money and possessions, such as bank accounts, bills, investments and your home. You can appoint different donees for each area. You can also name a replacement donee in case your first choice cannot act.
The LPA only takes effect if you lose capacity. While you still have capacity, you make your own decisions, and you can cancel (revoke) the LPA at any time. It ends when you die, and your will and your nominations take over from there.
You met Farah in Lesson 4.4. She is 29 (an invented example) and sends her mother S$800 a month by standing transfer. Suppose she has a bad accident on the way home. She survives, but a head injury leaves her unable to understand or make decisions for months.
After a while her salary stops. Her rent, her credit card bill and her mother's allowance keep falling due. Her mother only has the bank's phone number, and the bank will not let her access Farah's account.
Without an LPA, nobody automatically has the right to manage your affairs if you lose capacity. That includes your parents, your spouse and your adult children. Your family must apply to the court to be appointed your deputy. This involves forms, often legal fees, and weeks or months of waiting at a time that is already difficult. The court may also limit what the deputy is allowed to do. While the family waits, bills can go unpaid and accounts can stay frozen.
An LPA settles the question in advance, because the person you chose is the person who acts. With one, Farah could name her mother as her welfare donee, because her mother knows her best. For property and affairs she might name her older brother, who is organised with money and lives nearby, so the rent, the bills and the S$800 allowance keep being paid. She also names her brother as the replacement donee for her mother.
Choose your donees and decide which area each one covers. Talk to them before you name them. They are taking on real work and should hear your wishes from you directly. Fill in the form. Most people use Form 1, the standard form, which you complete online on the Office of the Public Guardian's website using Singpass. If you need wording outside the standard options, use Form 2, which a lawyer drafts. Get the form certified. You sign in front of a certificate issuer from the approved list: an accredited doctor, a practising lawyer or a registered psychiatrist. The issuer checks that you understand what you are signing and that nobody is pressuring you. Your donees also sign their part of the form. Submit the form to the Office of the Public Guardian, which registers it. Only a registered LPA can be used.
The forms, fees, list of certificate issuers and eligibility rules for donors and donees are all on the Office of the Public Guardian's website. They change from time to time, so check the website instead of relying on a figure someone mentions. The certificate issuer charges a separate fee for their time, so ask about it before you book.
Most people find the form easy and choosing the names hard. The two roles need different strengths.
Your welfare donee should be someone who knows your values and will speak up for you with doctors and family. Your property and affairs donee should be careful with money and honest, and should live close enough to go to a bank branch and handle paperwork.
One person can cover both areas, but two people often do it better. The relative you feel closest to may be the one who loses receipts. That person can still be a good welfare donee while someone more organised handles the money. Ask whether your choices will still make sense in five or ten years. If your first choice is a parent who may not be able to act later, name a replacement donee, as Farah did with her brother.
Before you go further, settle the two names. Think about who you would trust with your welfare and who with your money, and what makes each of them the right person.
Write down who you would pick as your donee for welfare and who for property, with one reason for each.
Junxiong-WFG Organisation is an authorised representative of AIA Financial Advisers Private Limited (Reg. No. 201715016G).