While this event has already occurred on 8 April 2026, you can purchase the recording and the papers, and when I run the event again you will be sent a link to attend live.
What does the recording cover?
While there is a lot of talk in legal circles about Powers of Attorney and the prevention of elder abuse, I feel most of the focus has been on drafting ever more complex clauses, or doing a better job of identifying abuse or risks that already exist.
I believe that the biggest risks with Powers of Attorney, and the most common abuse happens well after the client is sitting with the solicitor. How do we address this timing issue? What are the assumptions that clients bring to the document that make it hard for us to communicate this future risk? How do we help them to make better decisions now to protect themselves in the future?
In this Webinar we looked at what sort of client education we need to do to create a document that actually protects them, as well as the following topics -
What are the actual, common risks to people preparing these documents?
Which risks has the client already thought about, which ones do we need to educate them on?
What is our duty as solicitors to protect our clients from future elder abuse? How do we go about doing that?
Can adding a clause help? Can giving different advice help?
A review of some cases regarding elder abuse and challenges to the Power of Attorney
The timing of the abuse, or the problem, will impact what the appropriate response is. If you look at the above slide, if the child is already living with the parent then this is something that you can discuss at your initial consultation, and provide some advice or even draft some clauses to deal with. This is also something that the solicitor is probably already alert to, the risk of duress at the initial consultation. You can even structure your document and your appointment to try to avoid duress at this stage.
However, if the adult child does not move in with the parent until after preparation of the Power of Attorney, particularly in circumstances where the client insists that they won’t have a child come and live with them, then how can we protect a client from that risk. Can we protect a client from that risk? I think that we can, though it involves having more than a peripheral conversation about aging and medical needs.
The CPD Event
You can purchase the recording of the Webinar (which is a bit over an hour long) as well as the slides and the Workbook where I address these issues for $90. If you prefer to do your learning live that is fine, I will run the event again. Anyone who has bought the past papers will be contacted before I set the date for the new Webinar, to make sure that the date that I pick suits you.
In keeping with previous CPDs, you will get a $50 discount code if you email a requisition from the Supreme Court in relation to an Estate matter and provide enough information for the requisition to make sense. I will bundle them together and they will form part of the subject matter material available to participants. Email it to janis@janisconsults.com and then I will send you the discount code and a survey for you to complete with further questions.
If you have any questions then please reach out to me at janis@janisconsults.com
NSW Estate Lawyers Facebook Group
Did you know about the free Facebook Group? This is a group for NSW Estate Lawyers to discuss things that are particular to practising Estate law in this State. Here are some examples of things we might discuss -
(1) I have an overseas death certificate, it doesn’t fit the questions in the online system, has anyone else had this problem?
(2) Does anybody have better contact details for ABC bank?
(3) I have a Will where the parties divorced (so the Executor has since divorced the deceased), but the online system doesn’t seem to give me the option to respond with divorced (only deceased), what should I do?
Of course more recently there is a lot of discussion about pragmatic issues with the new online system. We might also share the occasional post that only other lawyers who practice in this area will appreciate. The idea is to help and support each other, and share information that is helpful.
If you would like to join you can just search for “NSW Estate Lawyers” in groups on Facebook, please make sure that you answer the questions.
