Completing a financial power of attorney with the support of an estate planning lawyer can give you peace of mind that if something happens to you, a trusted party known as your attorney-in-fact is eligible to take action on your behalf.
It’s natural to assume that the execution of this document in and of itself is enough to cover all of your bases. However, your financial power of attorney may not be automatically accepted by any government agency or financial institution despite the fact that it’s legally valid. This is not the case with the power of attorney for health care, which is why this is the most common of mistakes impacting financial power of attorney documents.
Working with your financial institutions now that you’ve executed this document can help to prevent delays in the future. Unfortunately, financial institutions all too often reject financial powers of attorney. They might want to see things, such as notarization even though your state might not require that your formal power of attorney document be notarized. Others might want certification, completion of a lengthy form or might want months to approve and review your power of attorney document.
Government entities can be very similar particularly with major agencies like social security that have their own procedures you need to follow. Contact your financial institution directly to learn more about what they expect with a financial power of attorney. Ask them if there are any specific pieces of paperwork and a general timeline you can expect. No one wants to deal with their power of attorney getting denied by the bank. Avoid that by planning in advance.
This way you can work directly with your estate planning lawyer to ensure that the execution of your power of attorney document helps you to achieve what you intended to.  Place a call to our Pasadena, CA estate planning law office for more information.
