One LPA works while you still have capacity. The other never does.
The single most useful thing to know about lasting powers of attorney is a timing rule that surprises almost everyone. A property and financial affairs LPA can be used as soon as it is registered, with your permission, even while you are fully capable of making your own decisions. A health and welfare LPA is the opposite: it can only ever be used once you are unable to make the relevant decision yourself. Both facts come straight from GOV.UK's lasting power of attorney guidance, yet a common assumption is that both documents sit dormant until capacity is lost. That assumption leaves people without financial help at exactly the moments they need it, such as a long hospital stay or the months after a stroke, when capacity may be intact but the practicalities of managing money are not.
This guide walks through what each type covers, when each can be used, the cost of setting them up, and how to decide whether you need one or both. It applies to England and Wales (Scotland and Northern Ireland run separate systems), and it is general information to help you understand the framework rather than legal advice on your own situation.
What each type of LPA covers
A lasting power of attorney is a legal document in which you (the donor) appoint one or more people (attorneys) to make decisions on your behalf. You must be 18 or over and have mental capacity when you make it. There are two types, and they divide the territory cleanly:
- Property and financial affairs LPA: managing bank and building society accounts, paying bills, collecting benefits or a pension, managing investments, and buying or selling property.
- Health and welfare LPA: your daily routine (washing, dressing, eating), medical care, decisions about moving into a care home, and, if you choose to give the authority, decisions about life-sustaining treatment.
The two documents do not overlap. A finance attorney has no say in whether you move into residential care, and a welfare attorney cannot access a penny of your money, even to pay for the care they have arranged. That is why the question "do I need both?" usually answers itself once you picture a real incapacity: someone has to deal with the care decisions, and someone has to pay for them.
The key difference: when each LPA can actually be used
| Property and financial affairs LPA | Health and welfare LPA | |
|---|---|---|
| What it covers | Money, bills, benefits, pensions, bank accounts, property | Daily routine, medical care, care home moves, life-sustaining treatment (if authorised) |
| When it can be used | As soon as it is registered, with your permission, unless you restrict it to capacity loss | Only when you are unable to make the decision yourself |
| While you have capacity | Attorney can act on your instructions | No effect at all |
| Registration fee | £92 | £92 |
| Ends | On your death (executors take over) | On your death |
The middle rows are where the practical value lives. With a registered property and finance LPA, your attorney can walk into your bank with the document and, with your permission, manage things while you are laid up, abroad, or simply tired of the admin. You remain in control: while you have capacity the attorney acts on your say-so, and you can revoke the arrangement at any time. If you would prefer the document to activate only if you lose capacity, you can write that restriction in, although banks then need evidence of incapacity before accepting the attorney's instructions, which slows everything down at a stressful time.
The health and welfare LPA has no equivalent early use, and for good reason. While you can consent to your own treatment and choose your own care, nobody else needs authority to do it for you. The document exists purely for the moment you cannot decide, and capacity is judged decision by decision under the Mental Capacity Act 2005. An attorney might take over a complicated hospital-discharge decision during a period of delirium while you carry on choosing your own meals, and if you recover, the decisions come back to you.
Why the timing rule matters: temporary incapacity
Consider Raj and Amara, married and in their early sixties. Raj, 62, has a stroke. His speech and mobility are badly affected for months, but his understanding is intact, so he does not lack capacity in the legal sense. Without an LPA, Amara cannot operate his sole-name accounts, and his salary protection payments, standing orders and a maturing fixed-rate bond all sit in accounts she cannot touch. A registered property and finance LPA solves this on day one: Raj gives permission, Amara acts. The health and welfare LPA, by contrast, stays in the drawer throughout, because Raj can still make his own care decisions and the document only operates when he cannot.
Now run the same scenario without any LPA and with Raj lacking capacity. Amara would need to apply to the Court of Protection to become his deputy, a process measured in months with ongoing supervision fees, and the court rarely appoints personal welfare deputies at all. Our guide to LPA vs deputyship after loss of capacity compares the two routes in detail, and the Court of Protection guide covers what deputyship involves. The short version: an LPA made in advance is cheaper, faster and puts the choice of decision-maker in your hands rather than the court's.
Want this checked against your specific situation?
Leave your details and a one-line summary. A probate specialist will reply within 24 hours, with no obligation.
What the two LPAs cost to set up
The Office of the Public Guardian charges £92 to register each LPA, confirmed on GOV.UK's registration page. The fee is per document, so:
- One person, both types: 2 x £92 = £184
- A couple, both types each: 4 x £92 = £368
You may qualify for a reduced fee of £46 per LPA if you earn less than £12,000 a year, and an exemption if you receive certain means-tested benefits such as Income Support. Registration takes 8 to 10 weeks if there are no mistakes in the forms, which is itself an argument for doing this early rather than waiting for a health scare. These figures are the registration fees only; solicitor drafting costs, if you use one, are separate. Our companion post on registering a lasting power of attorney walks through the process step by step.
Same attorneys for both, or different people?
Because the LPAs are separate documents, you choose attorneys for each independently. There is no rule requiring the same names on both, and the right split depends on your family:
- Same attorneys on both keeps things simple and avoids stand-offs between a welfare attorney arranging care and a finance attorney who must fund it.
- Different attorneys can play to strengths: an accountant sibling on the finance LPA, the child who lives nearby and knows your wishes on the welfare LPA. If you do split them, tell both sides, since care decisions and money decisions constantly interact.
- Multiple attorneys can be appointed on either document, acting jointly (all must agree) or jointly and severally (any one can act). Jointly and severally is more resilient: if one attorney dies or cannot act, the others continue.
Whoever you appoint, choose people you trust without reservation. A finance attorney with early access to your accounts is a feature when the trust is well placed and a serious risk when it is not.
Can you have one without the other?
Yes. Each LPA is valid on its own, and plenty of people start with just the property and finance LPA because its early usability makes it the more obviously practical document. But a lopsided setup leaves a gap. With only a finance LPA, care decisions after capacity loss fall to doctors and social services acting in your best interests; they must consult your family, but nobody in the family holds decision-making authority. With only a welfare LPA, your attorney can decide where you live but cannot pay the care home. And neither document does anything after death: both LPAs end the moment you die, when your will and executors take over, a handover explained in power of attorney vs probate.
LPAs are one piece of a complete plan alongside your will, and the same sitting often covers both. Our making a will checklist shows what a full estate plan involves, and the lasting power of attorney pillar guide goes deeper on the mechanics of both documents.
Deciding what you need
For most adults with any real assets or dependants, the honest answer is both documents, registered now rather than filed as a someday job, because an LPA can only be made while you still have capacity. If a stroke, accident or dementia diagnosis arrives first, the option disappears and the Court of Protection becomes the only route. The forms can be completed on GOV.UK without a solicitor, but where your situation has complications (a business, assets abroad, family friction, or doubts about who to appoint), a qualified estate planning practitioner can make sure the documents say what you actually intend, including any restrictions on when the finance LPA may be used. Getting the wording right once, while everything is calm, is what makes both documents work exactly as you expect on the day one of them is needed.