Older People Must Keep Vital Documents Safe

Keeping the ‘important stuff’ safe

Vital documents such as birth and marriage certificates, wills, lasting power of attorney, deeds, insurance certificates are all essential items that will be needed at some time in the future.  Often when these documents are needed it will be in a hurry and you realise that they are not where you thought they would be or indeed should be.  These situations lead to a huge amount of additional stress, expense and time wasting in what is usually a stressful situation to begin with.

None of us want to get older: we just want to be able to enjoy our time with family and friends without needing to worry about what comes next, so, it makes sense to get all the ‘important stuff’ in order right from the start, meaning that there is one less thing to worry about. It could be that elderly relatives have simply forgotten where they stored required documents, or maybe they were damaged or destroyed, or worse, they could have been stolen.  It might be simply that they are not all stored safely together in one place and it takes time to find the document needed.

Essential documents are very hard to replace

Whatever the reason for not being able to find these items, most people do not fully realise how valuable these documents are until they need them and cannot find them.   Only then do they realise how time consuming, expensive and stressful it is to replace them. In fact, keeping important documents safe is important for us all. no matter how old or young we are.  Take the story of Steve, whose vital documents were safe from a devastating house fire because he stored them away from his home.  This meant that he was able to deal with the insurance company quickly and efficiently and what was already a very stressful situation did not become any more so

What is the effort and cost involved in replacing lost or damaged documents

There are significant cost and time issues attached to having to replace key documents

• Birth/marriage certificate £24.95
• House deeds:  you will have to contact the land registry (cost?)
• Lasting power of attorney. This must be set up whilst your relatives are well enough to instruct a solicitor and cannot be granted once they are too ill to make their wishes known
• Insurance policies: you will need to contact individual insurance companies, who will undoubtedly need sight of birth and marriage certificates.

What options are available for secure document vaulting?

When most people think of document vaulting, it is either with their solicitor or bank. Solicitors will often offer to store someone’s will for free, in the hope that they will win the lucrative estate administration in the event of the death of that individual. That is obviously fine for a will, but they won’t typically hold other documents for you.

You could look to your local bank to store certain documents for you. However, many banks have stopped offering this service as it is difficult to manage, especially considering that so many services are outsourced overseas now. Even if they do agree to store your documents, at best you get to arrange the retrieval of them as a job-lot, and this has to be in person at an agreed time in the future. You certainly can’t arrange this if you are travelling overseas, or are away from your home town.

One final option would be to take on a contract with a self-storage facility. You’ll have seen these facilities around the outskirts of your town, however these locations are really set up as temporary storage, mostly short-term, and it’s a completely ‘hands-off’ service where you get a key and not much else.

Advantages of a dedicated vaulting service

Choosing a dedicated vaulting service, one which is specifically aimed at personal documents, has a number of advantages over alternative methods:

• Less stress for the whole family, as everyone knows that these important documents are safe and exactly where they should be.
• When moving/clearing the home, there is no danger of documents being lost or accidentally destroyed.
• There is no danger of forgetful elderly relatives moving them to another ‘safe place’.
• No danger of them being stolen in a household burglary.
• Storage in a fireproof vault keeps them safe from fire.
• All documents are held together in one secure place.
• Access to the original documents on an individual basis as needed.
• Access to scanned copies of all documents is available 24 hours a day.

myageingparent.com has partnered with Collective Legal Solutions to provide their audience with access to information and advice on legal planning measures that must be considered in later life.

Collective Legal Solutions are a 5 star rated legal services provider (see client reviews on Trustpilot here), specialising in inheritance related matters, such as Wills, Lasting Power of Attorney, Trusts, Asset Protection and Probate.

They provide free home consultations throughout England and Wales and can boast more than 30,000 satisfied clients.

Request your free information pack by clicking HERE

Or  call us now on 0800 1105221 to arrange your free home consultation. Please quote ‘MAP’ .

Secure Document Vaulting at Vital Documents offer a complete personal document storage service.  Documents are stored in a fully-insured police monitored former bank vault.  All documents are electronically archived giving you 24 hours access to scanned copies via a secure personal online portal.

For more information, or to sign up, simply go to Vital Documents or call us on 0333 122 8175.