It can detail any funeral plans and residential care wishes as well as assisting with financial planning and trusts and can be updated at any time. If you have a business, savings or a house or others you would like to look after, you should have a Will.

Your Will should be updated when you marry (this includes a civil partnership), divorce, have children or receive an inheritance (e.g. money, property, business, valuable or sentimental items) for example.

If you lose the ability to manage your own financial affairs through an accident or ill health, you might be surprised to learn that your partner or family cannot automatically take over on your behalf. To avoid this situation occurring it is good practice to put in place a Lasting Power of Attorney (LPA), a legal document that allows you to appoint someone you trust to make decisions on your behalf whilst you are still alive yet incapable of doing so yourself.

Without an LPA in place, if you lose capacity your family would need to apply to the Court of Protection, which is a time-consuming and costly process. It is far better to take care of this in advance. There are two types of LPA, a Property and Financial Affairs LPA and a Health and Welfare LPA. An LPA is not valid until it has been registered at The Office of the Public Guardian.