8 to 10 Weeks: Why a Power of Attorney Cannot Be Used the Day You Sign It, and Why I Tell Everyone to Start Now

By Helen Ashworth •Estate Planning •Updated 4 September 2026 •📖 13 min

The government takes 8 to 10 weeks to register a Power of Attorney. Until that day comes, the document cannot be used. Every week you wait moves that day further away.

My name is Helen Ashworth. For over 32 years I worked in probate and estate planning. Much of that was inside high-street solicitors’ practices, preparing Powers of Attorney.

Somewhere in your house there is probably a folder. Bank details in it. An old will. Perhaps a form you started and never finished.

You know the Power of Attorney is on that list. You have thought about it more than once. Then the kettle boils, or the phone goes, and the folder goes back in the drawer.

That is not carelessness. It is what happens to any job with no date on it.

So let me put a date on it.

There is one fact about these documents that almost nobody knows until it is too late to matter.

Signing is not the finish line.

A Power of Attorney only works once the government has registered it. The Office of the Public Guardian says that takes 8 to 10 weeks.¹ That is the time it takes when the form is right first time.

The 8 to 10 weeks only starts when a correct form reaches the Office of the Public Guardian. If there is a mistake the form comes back. The corrected form counts as a new application, so you go back to the start of the 8 to 10 week wait.

Gov.uk says you may be able to apply again within 3 months for £46. It depends on the type of mistake.⁵ That is why it is worth having the form done right the first time.

Until that registration comes back, the document is a piece of paper. The people you trust cannot use it for you. Not at the bank. Not at the hospital. Not anywhere.

So the question is never "have I signed it?" The question is "on what date can it actually be used?"

Send a correct form this week. If nothing comes back, that date is 8 to 10 weeks from the day it reaches the Office of the Public Guardian.¹

Put it off for three months, and that date moves three months further away.

Put it off for another year, the way most people do, and you may need it before it is ready.

Here is what the gap costs.

Say a person loses the ability to make their own decisions before the document is registered. The people close to them cannot simply step in. Being married does not give you that right. Being next of kin does not either.

Instead, someone has to ask the Court of Protection to make them a deputy. The government’s own published fees are £432 to apply and £100 for an assessment.¹ Then there is a yearly supervision fee of up to £320.¹

A judge decides who acts, not you. Every bill and every care decision waits until the court has finished.

A form, £92 to the government, and the 8 to 10 week wait would have kept the decision in your hands.

That is what kept me up at night for three decades. Not the people who chose not to do it. The people who meant to, and started too late.

Before we compare the three routes, check which of the two documents applies to you. There is one for property and money and one for health and care, and not everyone needs both. That part costs nothing to look at.

The clock only starts when the form reaches the government

This is the part people miss.

The 8 to 10 weeks does not start when you decide to sort it. It does not start when you book an appointment. It starts on the day a correct, signed form reaches the Office of the Public Guardian.

Everything you do before that day is added on top.

And there is a second clock hiding inside the first. If the form has a mistake on it, the government sends it back. You fix it and send it again. The 8 to 10 weeks starts from the beginning.

So two things decide the date you can use it. How soon does the form get sent? And is it right first time?

When I retired I sat down and judged the routes on those two things alone. Doing it yourself. A high-street solicitor. An online service. Here they are, one at a time.

Doing it yourself, direct with the government

First, the one fee nobody escapes: it costs £92 a document to register a Power of Attorney with the government.¹

That is the same £92 whether you do it yourself, use a solicitor, or use anyone else. It goes to the Office of the Public Guardian. It is a government charge, not a service fee.

The form itself is free to download, and you can start it today. On speed, that is a real point in its favour.

But it was written by lawyers, for lawyers. Eighteen pages, and another twenty-three pages of notes explaining how to fill them in.

There are six little things on that form that look obvious after 32 years and are not obvious to anyone else.

In 2024, across England and Wales, 133,760 applications³ were sent back or rejected. It is nearly one in every ten sent in.

That figure came from the Office of the Public Guardian itself, released under Freedom of Information and reported by MoneyWeek.

Each one of those is a form that had to be done again. And each one is an 8 to 10 week clock that went back to zero.

If a person loses the ability to sign while the form goes back and forth, it can never be put right. The only route left then is the Court of Protection.

Doing it yourself is quick to start and slow to finish.

A high-street solicitor

A solicitor is typically £300 to £600 a document.⁴ Both documents for one person are typically £600 to £1,200.⁴ A solicitor is typically £1,140 to £2,160 for a couple’s full set of four.⁴

Keystone’s price is £89 a document, plus the £92 government fee that every route pays.

Some companies charge over £700 for a single Power of Attorney. Slee Blackwell Solicitors and Susan Howarth & Co both publish fixed fees above that, from their own price lists.⁴

That is the number that makes people shut the drawer and put it off another year.

The work is good. I will not pretend otherwise. The practices I worked in were good ones.

But there is a cost nobody puts on the price list, and it is measured in weeks.

First you ring for an appointment. Then you wait for it. At the meeting you answer the questions. Then the draft is prepared, and you go back in to sign it.

Then your witness and your chosen people sign, in the right order. That often means another visit, or a round of post.

Only then does the form go to the government. Only then does the 8 to 10 weeks begin.

A solicitor's form is very likely to be right first time. That is what you are paying for. But by the time the clock starts, a month or more has often gone by.

And the form is the government's form, the same free one anyone can download. There is no special private version. The fee pays for the checking, and for the building on the high street.

So that is where most people are left. A free form they are not confident filling in. Or a bill for hundreds of pounds they cannot justify. Both of those are why the folder goes back in the drawer.

And remember what a mistake costs. The corrected form counts as a new application, so the 8 to 10 week wait starts from the beginning.⁵

The gap nobody filled

For thirty-two years I watched people choose between those two options.

And the maddening thing is that the work in the middle, the bit that actually matters, is small.

It is one careful hour. Someone who knows the form checks that the right people sign, in the right order, in the right places. All before it goes near the government.

That one hour gives a form its best chance of being accepted first time. It is what keeps a form out of the 133,760³ that came back.

That hour is the whole value a solicitor adds. And for decades, nobody offered that hour on its own, at a fair price, without the wait.

As it turns out, somebody finally has.

Keystone Estate Planning: £89 a document, started today, with a free Will worth £59

This is the one that surprised me.

When I first heard of an online service doing exactly that checking for £89 a document, I was sceptical.

After 32 years you assume anything that cheap must be cutting the corner that matters.

They use the same official government forms I worked with for years. One for your property and money. One for your health and care.

The document Keystone produces is not a cheaper version of the solicitor's document. It is the same document. The same official government form. Registered the same way, and it carries the same legal force once the register comes back.

What you are paying for is the checking. Before anything is sent off, a real person reads your answers. They check that the right people sign, in the right order, in the right places.

Now the part that matters for the clock.

You start the form today, on your phone or at the kitchen table. There is no appointment to wait for. It takes about 15 minutes to complete from home.

You can stop and come back later. Your answers are saved.

Then your documents are professionally checked and posted to you. You sign them and send them to the government.

A form started this afternoon can be on its way to the government. That is before a solicitor could even fit you in for a first appointment.

That checking is aimed squarely at the reason 133,760 applications³ were sent back or rejected in 2024. It is the one hour of work aimed at making the 8 to 10 weeks run once rather than twice.

Reviews from Trustpilot

You do not have to take my word for the checking. These are Keystone’s own reviews, quoted word for word from its Trustpilot profile, read on 3 September 2026. They are about the part I have just described: getting the signing right, and putting a mistake right quickly.

Over 2,000 people across England and Wales have used Keystone.

What it costs, and what you get

Then there is the cost.

One thing to know before the prices, because it is what catches people out at the end. Whichever route you choose, the government charges £92 a document to register it.¹ That fee goes to the Office of the Public Guardian and to nobody else. A solicitor adds it to your bill. Doing it yourself, you pay it direct. With Keystone you pay it at the end, when your checked form is ready to send. It is the one fee that never changes, and every route pays it.

What changes is what you pay on top of that £92. £89 a document, for the same form. A solicitor is typically £300 to £600 a document.⁴ Some companies charge over £700 for a single Power of Attorney: Slee Blackwell Solicitors and Susan Howarth & Co both publish fixed fees above that.⁴

Both documents together are £155. Against a solicitor at the typical rate for two documents, that is a saving of £445 to £1,045.⁴ It also saves £23 on the £178 list price.

A couple's full set of four is £285, which saves £71 on £356. And every person gets their own free Will included, normally £59.

You do not pay a penny to begin. You start the form free and answer the questions in your own time. You only pay at the end, once you have seen exactly what you are getting.

The three routes, side by side

Here is the honest comparison. Everyone pays the government the same £92 a document to register, whichever route they take.¹ What changes is what you pay on top. And how soon the clock starts.

The 8 to 10 week wait is fixed. The only thing you control is when it begins. Only one route lets you get the form filled in and checked today.

What each route costs in total

Most price comparisons leave the government fee out. That makes every route look cheaper than it is. Here it is put back in. So the fair question is not what a service charges. It is what leaves your account in total.

The registration fee is £92 for each document, paid to the Office of the Public Guardian.¹ It is a government charge, not a service fee, and it is not part of anybody’s price. Both documents for one person means £184 of it.¹ A couple’s full set of four means £368.¹

The £92 a document is the one line that never moves. Nobody can discount it or pay it for you. And nobody but the Office of the Public Guardian registers these documents. No service, Keystone included, can register one for you, shorten the 8 to 10 weeks, or promise you a date.¹

My recommendation

After 32 years preparing these documents, here is what I tell everyone who asks.

Say you have a legal background. If you are sure you can get all six of those little things right, doing it yourself is fine. It is £92 a document¹ and the form is free. Just be honest about the odds. Nearly one in ten forms comes back, and the clock starts again when it does.

If money is no object and you want a meeting in a solicitor's office, the high-street route is fine. The work will be done properly. Just know that the appointments come first. The 8 to 10 weeks comes after them.

But most people I worked with cannot justify hundreds of pounds a document. They cannot afford to lose another 8 to 10 weeks to a wrong tick. And they would rather the clock started this week than next spring. If that is you, start with Keystone.

It is not for everyone. If your affairs are complicated, or you want legal advice rather than a checked form, see a solicitor. Keystone prepares and checks documents. It does not give legal advice.

Back to that folder in the drawer

I want to finish where we started.

The folder is still there. The Power of Attorney is still on the list. Nothing about today has changed that, except one thing. You now know what the delay actually costs.

It is not the money. It is the date. Every week the folder stays shut, the day the document can be used moves a week further away. That day is the only one that matters.

In thirty-two years I never once met somebody who regretted doing this early. I met a great many who wished they had.

So do the small version today. Not the whole job. Just the first step. Look at which of the two documents applies to you, which costs nothing and takes about a minute. If it is not for you, close the tab and you have lost nothing but the minute.

And if it is for you, get the form filled in and checked this week, sign it, send it. Then the 8 to 10 weeks is running in the background.

That is the whole of my advice, after thirty-two years of giving it. The free check below is where it starts.