-1.png?height=120&name=Success%20Hub%20(9)-1.png)
Email Headline: We now do Enduring Powers of Attorney, Wills and SMSF Wills
The Coronavirus is having a huge impact on society. Many of our clients are concerned for their own safety and that of their family. We are asking ourselves a whole range of questions including what happens if I or one of my family get the virus? Will it spiral out of control? What about the elderly members of the family over age 60 who seem to be more susceptible?
We don’t have answers to these questions but what we do now is that it is important, if not vital, to ensure, while fit, competent and able, that you safeguard your financial affairs by giving a spouse, relative or close associate your enduring power of attorney (EPOA). This enables your EPOA to act on your behalf if you become sick, are quarantined for a long time or become incapable of managing your financial or health affairs. In addition your EPOA may be given the power to take your position as trustee of a self-managed super fund (SMSF) if your deed allows. Plus for companies where you may be the sole director you can use our special process to set up your attorney as a successor director in the event of incapacity or death.
Apart from an EPOA, it is also important to put in place a Will or revisit your Will if it has not been looked at in the last two years. The coronavirus shows us that change can happen quickly and we must prepare for change. A great safeguard, at this very moment is to put in place an Enduring Power of Attorney and create/update your Will and that of your closest loved ones. So many young families have neither document relying on the Courts to solve these issues, yet the Courts may be quarantined or closed.
And for those with a SMSF it is important to complete a SMSF Will which is a set of instructions and directions to the trustee of your fund as to how you wish your superannuation benefits to be distributed in the event of your death. You may not be aware but your Will cannot dispose of your superannuation, it has to be a special purpose document and we prefer to use the SMSF Will. The traditional binding death benefit nomination has been caught up in more than 20 legal cases and is out of favour.
Importantly our firm now offers EPOA's, Wills and SMSF Wills through our partnership with Lawyers and specialist estate planning advisers, Abbott & Mourly to provide you and your family with these important solutions in these challenging times. Plus the Wills and SMSF Wills that we build for you have the unique option of limiting any distribution to your family lineage only. This protects your hard earned family wealth. In terms of completing the documents we have been suggesting it for clients when we do reviews but the feedback we are getting from clients is that it is important to do right now which is why we are emailing you.
The Process is simple and quick if you get your Power of Attorney and Executors right
The person who you nominate as your attorney can also be the Executor of your Will to ensure safety, certainty, security and continuity. It may be more than one – known as joint attorneys and Executors. The person or persons you choose will look after your financial, health and super affairs in the event of an illness or anxiety should you so choose. In addition they will be tasked as Executor with looking after your estate upon your death, managing any of your specific gifts such as property going to one or more family members, jewellery to grandchildren and well anything you desire. They can also limit any disposition of your estate to your lineage – which is your direct descendants or to blood relatives only which may include brothers and sisters in the event that a main or specific beneficiary is not alive.
Important: Build a line of EPOAs and Executors: Abbott & Mourly lawyers advise that you should provide a second in line attorney and Executor in case, when the time comes, the person or persons you appointed cannot or might not want to take up the role you have endowed upon them. And it does not hurt to have a second successor EPOA and Executor. Safety, certainty and security are paramount. If something happens we want to make sure your family are looked after quickly.
As your adviser we strongly recommend that together we undertake a fast and simple three step process to implement your EPOA, Will and SMSF Will if you have a SMSF:
- Complete the quick interview and data capture attached, send to us as soon as possible so we can work with Abbott & Mourly to draft your EPOA and Will.
- We will get together and review the EPOA and Will to ensure it is tax efficient and covers all the bases.
- We have an option to include a detailed legal review of all documents prepared from your data capture with lawyers from Abbott & Mourly which will include two Zoom meetings with the lawyers to ensure that your current financial and health affairs, deceased estate and superannuation death benefits are protected from litigation, challenge and for family lineage only.
We are very busy at the moment but our client’s EPOAs, Wills and SMSF Wills are the top of our list of priorities. Please complete the Data Capture attached and send to us as soon as possible and we will come back and liaise with you on costings. At this time there is no cost for this service until your EPOA, Will and SMSF Will are prepared.
There is no time to waste and the relief of getting these documents completed will take a lot of weight off your shoulders.