A Lasting Power of Attorney (LPA) is a legal document that lets you, while you still have mental capacity, appoint someone you trust to manage your money and your care if you later lose that capacity through a stroke, dementia or a serious accident. In 2026 the standard LPA Form 1 is free for Singapore citizens, the application fee having been permanently waived from 1 April 2026; according to the Office of the Public Guardian fees table, permanent residents pay $30 and foreigners pay $160. You apply online through the Office of the Public Guardian portal using Singpass, get certified in person by an accredited doctor or lawyer, and your donees accept their roles digitally. The whole thing is cheap and fast compared with the alternative, which is your family applying to court for a deputyship after you have already lost capacity. This guide covers what an LPA does, who you can appoint, the exact 2026 fees, and the step-by-step application.
An LPA only matters if you lose mental capacity. While you can still make your own decisions, the document does nothing and the people you appoint have no power. The moment a doctor assesses that you can no longer understand or make a particular decision, the LPA activates and the person you chose can step in to act for you.
Mental capacity here is the legal kind defined under the Mental Capacity Act: the ability to understand information, weigh it, and communicate a decision. Losing it is more common than most young adults assume. A bad accident at 30, early-onset dementia, or a stroke can take it away with no warning. Without an LPA, nobody, not your spouse, not your parents, automatically has the right to access your bank account or decide on your medical care.
The person making the LPA is the donor. The person or people you appoint are your donees. You must be at least 21 to make one, and so must your donees. You make it now, in advance, precisely because you cannot make one once capacity is gone.
An LPA splits your donees' authority into two separate areas. You decide whether to grant one or both, and you can appoint different people for each.
You can give your donee a free hand within an area, or attach restrictions and conditions, for example requiring two donees to agree jointly before selling property. Form 1, the standard form, lets you grant these powers with a set of standard restrictions. If you want bespoke powers beyond that, you need Form 2.
There are two versions of the LPA, and which one you need depends on how complicated your wishes are.
Form 1 is the standard form, and the Office of the Public Guardian says it covers about 98% of citizen applications. It lets you appoint up to two donees plus one replacement donee, and grants general powers with standard restrictions. You fill it in yourself online; no lawyer is required to draft it.
Form 2 is the customised version, for people who want to appoint more than two donees, set unusual conditions, or carve out specific powers. Because the wording has to be drafted properly, you must engage a lawyer to prepare a Form 2. The lawyer's drafting fee is on top of the application fee.
| Feature | Form 1 (standard) | Form 2 (customised) |
|---|---|---|
| Who it suits | Most people | Complex or unusual wishes |
| Donees allowed | Up to 2 + 1 replacement | More than 2 possible |
| Powers | General, standard restrictions | Tailored, lawyer-drafted |
| Lawyer needed to draft | No | Yes |
| Application fee, citizen | Free | $30 |
There are two separate costs to budget for: the application fee paid to the Office of the Public Guardian, and the certification fee paid to the doctor or lawyer who acts as your certificate issuer. They are not the same thing, and the second one is not waived.
From 1 April 2026 the application fee for LPA Form 1 was permanently waived for Singapore citizens. The Minister of State for Social and Family Development, Goh Pei Ming, announced the permanent waiver in Parliament on 5 March 2026, making permanent a temporary waiver that had been repeatedly extended since 2014. The current fees for permanent residents and foreigners are set out by the Office of the Public Guardian in its published LPA fees table.
| Applicant | Form 1 fee | Form 2 fee |
|---|---|---|
| Singapore citizen | Free | $30 |
| Permanent resident | $30 | $30 |
| Foreigner | $160 | $160 |
On top of that you pay your certificate issuer. An accredited doctor or a practising lawyer has to certify that you understand the document and are not being pressured into it. Their fees are set by the practice, not the government, so they vary; many GP clinics and law firms advertise certification in the low-to-mid hundreds of dollars, and some run promotions, so it pays to call a few and compare before you book. Cancelling the registration of an LPA later costs $28.
Even with the doctor's fee, an LPA is one of the cheaper pieces of personal admin you will do. Set it against the cost of the alternative, covered further down, and it is a clear win. If you are sorting out your wider financial life at the same time, it fits naturally alongside a will and a CPF nomination as the three documents that decide what happens to you and your money when you cannot decide for yourself.
Choosing the right donee matters more than any other decision in the LPA, because this person will control your money or your care with very little day-to-day oversight. The rules on who qualifies are short, but the judgement call is yours.
A donee must be at least 21 years old and must be someone you genuinely trust. You can appoint your spouse, an adult child, a sibling, a close friend, or a professional. There are a few hard limits worth knowing.
If you appoint two donees, you choose how they act: jointly (they must agree on everything together), or jointly and severally (either can act alone). Jointly is safer against misuse but slower and more fragile, because if one donee drops out, a joint appointment can collapse. Jointly and severally is more practical for paying bills, at the cost of one person being able to act without the other.
Handing over your money and care does not hand over a blank cheque. The Mental Capacity Act ring-fences a list of decisions that no donee can ever make for you, no matter how broad the powers in your LPA look. Knowing these limits upfront stops two problems: a donor expecting their donee to handle something the law forbids, and a donee overstepping without realising it.
Some powers are excluded outright. Others are only available if you write them into the LPA itself, so if they matter to you, spell them out while you are drafting the document rather than assuming the donee can act later.
Alongside the prohibitions, a donee carries positive duties under the Act. They must act in your best interests, follow the five statutory principles, and keep within the powers your LPA actually grants. A property and affairs donee must keep accounts and keep your money separate from their own, which is the paper trail that protects both of you if anyone ever questions a transaction. A donee must not take advantage of the position to benefit themselves, and cannot pass the role to someone else.
An LPA sits dormant from registration until the moment you lose capacity, and a lot of people never think through what happens at that point. The trigger is medical, not automatic. Your donee can only start acting once a registered medical practitioner has certified that you have lost the mental capacity to manage the relevant matter. The Office of the Public Guardian publishes a medical report template for exactly this, and any registered doctor can complete it.
With that certification in hand, your donee does not wave a paper LPA around. Because everything is digital now, they send your electronic LPA straight to the bank, HDB, CPF Board, insurer or other agency through their own OPGO dashboard, which guarantees the institution is relying on the current registered version. The agency may also ask for the donee's NRIC and the doctor's medical report before they act.
One detail catches families off guard: the OPG does not dictate what banks or other agencies will accept, and each sets its own conditions. A bank may want its own forms or a recent medical report on top of the LPA. The lesson for the donor is to keep the LPA current and tell your donee where it lives and how to reach it, because the smoothest activation is one where the donee already knows the drill.
Giving someone control of your money raises an obvious worry: what if they misuse it. The system has teeth. The Office of the Public Guardian maintains the LPA register and investigates any alleged breach of the Mental Capacity Act, including complaints about how a donee is exercising their powers. A donee who manages your affairs poorly can be placed under closer OPG supervision.
Where there is real wrongdoing, the OPG can apply to court to suspend or revoke an errant donee's appointment and order them to make restitution, and it can refer cases involving fraud or financial mismanagement to the police. The OPG can also send a Board of Visitors, made up of medical professionals and elder-care practitioners, to check on the well-being of a person who lacks capacity. These safeguards are the reason the certification step is done face to face and the reason naming a trustworthy donee matters more than naming a convenient one.
Since the Office of the Public Guardian moved the whole process online, applying is done through the OPGO portal with Singpass. The online route is now the default; the OPG only accepts a hardcopy form in exceptional situations and with the Public Guardian's approval. Here is the sequence for a standard Form 1.
Moving everything onto OPGO roughly halved the registration time compared with the old paper process, on top of the three-week statutory wait. You do not need to do anything during the waiting period; you will be notified once the LPA is registered.
This is the part that makes the small effort worth it. If you lose mental capacity without an LPA, your loved ones cannot simply take over. Your bank will freeze access, your CPF cannot be touched on your behalf, and even your spouse has no automatic right to manage your share of a jointly owned flat.
To get any authority, your family has to apply to the Family Justice Courts to be appointed as your deputy under the Mental Capacity Act. A deputyship application involves lawyers, a medical report, and a court process that commonly takes several months and costs far more than an LPA, often a few thousand dollars or more once legal fees are added. The court, not you, decides who gets appointed and what they can do, and the deputy may be required to report to the OPG and even put up a security bond.
An LPA flips all of that. You choose your person while you are well, the cost is small, and there is no court involvement when it is needed. It belongs in the same planning conversation as deciding how you will fund elderly care and reviewing your life insurance, because all three are about who carries the load when you cannot.
| Factor | LPA (made in advance) | Deputyship (court, after the fact) |
|---|---|---|
| When you set it up | While you still have capacity | Only after capacity is already lost |
| Who chooses your decision-maker | You do | The Family Justice Courts decide |
| Process | Online via OPGO, certified in person | Court application with lawyers and a medical report |
| Typical timeline | Weeks | Several months |
| Typical cost | Free to low hundreds for citizens | Often a few thousand dollars or more |
| Ongoing duties | Light, OPG oversight if needed | May require reports and a security bond |
An LPA is not set and forget. Life changes, and so should the document. You can revoke your LPA at any time while you still have mental capacity, for example after a divorce, after a fallout with a donee, or simply because you want to appoint someone else. Revocation is done formally and recorded with the OPG.
Divorce deserves its own warning. If your donee is your spouse and the marriage is later dissolved or annulled, that appointment is cancelled automatically unless your LPA specifically says it should survive. People who divorce and forget to redo their LPA can end up with an ex-spouse named as donee and no valid backup, which quietly defeats the whole document. Review who you have named after any major life event: marriage, divorce, the death of a donee, or a child turning 21 and becoming eligible.
An LPA also pairs naturally with an Advance Care Plan. The LPA names who decides; an ACP records what you would actually want for your care and treatment, which gives a personal welfare donee something concrete to follow rather than guessing. Tell your donees where to find the LPA and how it works, because a document nobody knows about is no help in a crisis. The OPG hotline is 1800-111-2222 if you need to check the status of yours or get help with the portal.
The LPA Form 1 application fee is free for Singapore citizens, permanently waived from 1 April 2026. Permanent residents pay $30 and foreigners pay $160. Form 2 costs $30 for citizens and PRs and $160 for foreigners. On top of the application fee you pay your certificate issuer (an accredited doctor or lawyer) a separate certification fee, which the practice sets itself.
Yes. The application fee for the standard LPA Form 1 is permanently free for Singapore citizens from 1 April 2026. This replaced the earlier temporary waiver. You still pay your certificate issuer's separate certification fee, which is not waived.
An LPA applies while you are alive but have lost mental capacity, letting your donee manage your money and care. A will only takes effect after you die and decides who inherits your estate. They cover different moments and you should have both. An LPA does nothing after death, and a will does nothing while you are alive but incapacitated.
An accredited medical practitioner, a practising lawyer, or a psychiatrist. They must meet you in person to confirm you understand the LPA and are not being pressured into it before they certify the form. Their fee is set by the practice, so it varies, and it is separate from the OPG application fee.
Yes. LPAs are now made through the Office of the Public Guardian Online (OPGO) portal using Singpass. You complete the form online, your donees accept their roles digitally with their own Singpass, and you then visit a certificate issuer in person to be certified. The online route is the default; the OPG only accepts a hardcopy form in exceptional situations and with the Public Guardian's approval.
After certification and submission, there is a mandatory three-week waiting period during which objections can be raised. If none are valid, the LPA is registered. Processing time on the OPG side was roughly halved after the process moved online, but the three-week statutory wait still applies on top.
Your family cannot automatically manage your money or care. They must apply to the Family Justice Courts to be appointed as your deputy under the Mental Capacity Act, which involves lawyers, a medical report, and a process that commonly takes months and costs several thousand dollars. The court decides who is appointed and what powers they get.
Yes, as long as you still have mental capacity. You can revoke the LPA at any time, for example after a divorce or a falling out with a donee, and make a new one. Cancelling the registration of an LPA costs $28. You should review who you have named after any major life event.
No. The Mental Capacity Act forbids it. A donee cannot make or change your will, and cannot make or revoke a nomination for your CPF accounts or an insurance policy, even with the broadest LPA powers. Those decisions stay with you while you have capacity, so make your will and CPF nomination separately and well before any loss of capacity.
If your donee is your spouse, the appointment is cancelled automatically when the marriage is dissolved or annulled, unless your LPA specifically states that it should continue. After a divorce, redo your LPA so you are not left with an ex-spouse as donee and no valid backup. Review and revise it after any major life event.
Report it to the Office of the Public Guardian, which investigates alleged breaches of the Mental Capacity Act, including complaints about how donees use their powers. The OPG can place a donee under closer supervision, apply to court to suspend or revoke an errant donee and order restitution, and refer fraud or financial mismanagement to the police. A property and affairs donee must keep accounts, which makes misuse easier to spot.
A donee can only act once a registered medical practitioner certifies that you have lost mental capacity. The donee then sends your electronic LPA to the bank through their OPGO dashboard so the bank relies on the current version. The bank may also ask for the donee's NRIC and the doctor's medical report, and can set its own conditions, since the OPG does not dictate what third parties require.
This is general financial information for Singapore, not personal financial advice. Figures change — verify current rates against the official sources above before acting. See our full disclaimer.