Supporting someone else with their finances

We want to make it easy for our customers to appoint someone else to help them manage their account, so we‘ve put together some useful information to help.

They may need to rely on a partner, relative or friend to do this. It could be for a short period to help the person recover from a difficult experience or for a long period, for example, when our customer has a long-term illness or is unable to make their own decisions because of mental illness or other reasons).

Things to consider before deciding what kind of support to put in place:

• How long will they need someone to manage their finances for?
• What kind of interactions do they need help with?
• What will you be expected to do and can you commit to it?

MoneyHelper provides information about choosing someone to help you with your money and how to deal with different types of businesses.

Emergency Contact: If our customer’s situation means that they are incapacitated and unable to take care of themselves or their affairs, then tell us. Our team can offer short-term support while you get more formal support in place. 

Third Party Authorisation: A customer can request your details to be added to their account if: 

• They need help managing their account
• They have difficulty communicating and need some help managing contact with us 
• You already help them manage their finances 
• The customer's situation means they cannot contact us in the short or long term 

A customer will need to be able to tell us they want you to support them and manage their account. They can do this via telephone or by completing a third-party authorisation form contact us and returning this to us. 

Lasting Power of Attorney (Property and Financial Affairs): Is a way a person can give you permission to act on their behalf and make decisions for them. It might be useful for you to become their attorney on a permanent basis if: 

• Our customer has a condition that makes it difficult for them to manage things consistently 
• You think they’re losing mental capacity 
• They need to go into hospital and won’t be able to manage 
• Court of Protection Order: The Court of Protection makes decisions on financial or welfare matters for people who can’t make decisions at the time they need to be made (they ‘lack mental capacity’). 

If you have Power of Attorney or a Court of Protection Order, send these to us and our specialist team will support you.