Vision, frailty, or dementia can make money management difficult as you age. When investment, income and expense decisions intersect with life-sustaining care, hospice, and death decisions it can get complicated. If the primary caregiver is also the ‘chief financial officer’ it’s a bigger burden and can be a temptation.

Good controls let you separate and delegate responsibility to protect yourself and the people who help you. Every situation is different. Professionals can help, but if you depend primarily on family for support and care, clarity about roles and responsibilities can avoid ill will. Examples of roles and responsibility include:

An investment advisor with a good Investment Policy Statement that addresses liquidity, investment timeframes, allocations, and prohibitions, clearly limits the advisor’s discretion. Regular transfers of a set amount to an un-linked checking account separate the investment and disbursement functions. Statement copies should go to an authorized agent(s).

An authorized agent: Major expenses happen, and investment policies change. You need a person with authority to act and protect your investments if you can’t. It may be a family member or an independent trustee on a Medicaid Trust.

A bookkeeper prepares invoices, payments and reconciles the account. You should authorize payments before they are processed, but the ultimate control is limiting the money in the disbursement account and who can authorize disbursements.

An authorized signer can step in to authorize disbursements if you can’t. (This also helps for long trips.)

A primary caregiver: There are different caregiver roles including:

1. Daily assistance with living,

2. Medical decisions about life-sustaining and hospice treatments

3. Financial support and oversight.

They may involve a personal care agreement and compensation. If so, the agreement, time and expenses need to be well documented for tax reasons and transparent for coordination and communication.

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