On 10 May 2024, the UK government published updated guidance relating to the ‘View an LPA’ service in England and Wales.
This is a secure service whereby a registered Lasting Power of Attorney (‘LPA’) can be viewed online by different companies and organisations, enabling quicker action in an increasingly paperless world.
The service is open to those LPAs registered on or after 1 January 2016 and provides a digital one-page summary of all the information needed to confirm that the LPA is valid. The service provides key information including the details of the donor and attorney(s), how decisions are made by the attorneys and any instructions and preferences written by the donor.
Upon registering an LPA, you will receive a registration letter that contains a reference number and an activation key with which the donor or attorney(s) can create an account. Once an online account has been opened, a 13-character access code can be generated.
There are many advantages to the new service, in particular that it reduces the time taken to register an LPA’s existence on accounts with organisations, such as banks, utility companies and DWP. Once viewed, the organisation can download the summary for their records and should therefore only need to access the LPA online once. They can then allow you to make decisions for the donor immediately, for example giving you access to their accounts.
It can take considerably longer when posting the original paper version of the LPA and waiting for an organisation to receive this and return it back, before you can then lodge it with another organisation. In contrast, the View an LPA service can facilitate urgent action whilst simultaneously allowing more than one person to use the LPA at the same time.
Overall, the service is a step in the right direction towards placing LPAs on a digital footing.
For more information please contact our Wills and Probate department on 0345 646 0406 or fill in our online enquiry form and a member of the team will be in touch.