Page 32 - Amarillo Senior Link Magazine Winter 2020- Online Magazine

SENIOR RESOURCES

Two ToolS You neeD for

Effective Estate Planning

by Lee Franks
f asked to define estate planning, Two basic documents that can assist the agent to act in the best interests of
most people might suggest that caregivers are the medical power of the principal and restrains the agent’s
Ithe phrase has to do with who gets attorney and a financial power of ability to profit from the relationship.
your stuff when you die. Although attorney.
correct, estate planning also involves Effective medical and financial powers
planning for life – particularly for life In granting a medical power of of attorney can greatly simplify caring
beyond normal, functional capacity. attorney, a person authorizes an agent for an aged or ailing loved one. Estate
to make their health care decisions. planning involves more than divvying
A fifty-nine-year-old business office Typically, the document names one or up what remains of someone’s
manager, mother, and grandmother more alternates and states where the belongings. Good estate planning
struggles to give her employer a full original is kept and where copies may contemplates life as well as death, and
forty hours each week, to attend one be found. While you can require two it includes smoothing out procedures
school event for each grandchild or more agents to act jointly, it is not for the very people who made that life
monthly, to provide her husband advisable to do so. worth living – those who provide care
with the companionship he deserves, and comfort during one’s final years.
and to care for her father who is After executing a medical power of
battling dementia. She has tried to attorney, copies of the document
make some long-term decisions for should be
him and to get his affairs in order. His furnished to
financial judgment failed a long time the agents and
before anyone realized something institutions who
was wrong, but the bank tells her she will likely need
has no authority to act for him. Just it. Give copies to
as worrying, the customer service your health care
representative at his health insurance providers and
company is only authorized to speak contact your local
with her father, who is unable to hospital or clinic
handle that call in the professional about getting the
way he once would have. document on file.

These are common conflicts in which In granting a
the caregiver finds him or herself. financial power
Commonly, the eldest or the nearest of attorney, an
adult child ends up in the caregiving individual gives
role by default. In other words, no one another person
planned for things to happen as they the authority to
did; the situation just evolved. conduct business
on their behalf.
When the caregiver lacks effective The document
legal tools to do the job, caring for may limit
an aging or ailing loved one can the authority
overwhelm financial and emotional to specified
resources. Those who accept the call transactions, or
to provide care may wonder why they the document
did so and also how to prevent their may grant very
own children from being placed in a broad powers.
similar position one day. The law requires

32 Amarillo Senior Link