Lasting Powers of Attorney - Margaret's story
Margaret is 77. She has an investment portfolio with a company, Peanuts, who manage the portfolio through a Discretionary Fund Manager (DFM). That means that she agrees the sort of investments that she would be comfortable but the DFM makes the decisions about what shares to invest in and when to buy or sell those rather than Margaret authorising each sale or purchase.
Margaret made a Lasting Power of Attorney (LPA) several years back to allow her sons to look after her money, including the investments, if she lost the mental capacity to do that herself. Unfortunately, she wasn't told that she would need to put a special clause in her LPA to allow her attorneys to invest her funds with a DFM. It doesn't matter that she already had investments with Peanuts.
Margaret has now lost capacity. Her sons think that it is best to keep her investments with Peanuts. This is because she has used them for twenty years and always spoke highly of the firm.
The sons approach Wrigleys for help. We advise that to keep using Peanuts, they would need to ask the Court of Protection for an order authorising them to invest Margaret's funds with a DFM. We apply, the order is granted and the sons are able to keep Margaret's money with Peanuts.
The sons decide to make LPA's with Wrigleys themselves, and we include the clause allowing their funds to be invested with a DFM, in case they want their attorneys to be able to do that.
