Looking after other people’s money

This page covers:
• Why family or friends became involved with managing someone else’s money
• Examples of what people did to manage money and spending

When older relatives started to need help at home or to pay for care, family members often became more aware of their relatives’ finances and how well they were managing them. This helped with managing paying for care but also helped in other areas as well, such as getting better deals on utility bills and spotting possible scams.

Getting the best returns on money

Some older people had quite large sums of money in the bank. For example, when people moved to a care home and sold their house, there could be significant sums of money to deal with. Families were often responsible for finding the best place for the money to give good returns to help pay for care.

Eisha filled in questionnaires about her diet and emotional wellbeing for a parent and baby cohort study she took part in.

Age at interview 32

Gender Female

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Yeah, they talked about how do you, they talked about healthy eating, so there was a lot of questions regarding, What do you eat?’ How many meals?’ How many fruit intake is in your diet?’ and then there were question regarding, How do you feel?’ How your moods?’ Are-, are you teary? Are you happy? So vaguely, I don’t remember clearly but I think those were the questions, yeah.

So, they were looking for if a mum is healthy, how does that impact on a baby for baby mental health and growth. If a mum is mentally, having any mental health issues, how will that impact on the weight, on the size of the baby. The food intake as well was in the questionnaires, so what I’m eating and taking in as a diet is affecting my child.

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Some older people recognised that they were struggling to manage their money and asked their partner, children, or someone else they trust to help out. When people started to look after their loved ones’ affairs, they were often shocked to find things had been neglected for a while. Sometimes people were paying much more than they should for goods and services. When family members started to look after their accounts they were able to get better deals on utility bills, insurance and other household spending. This could all help with paying for care.

Lucy asked the researchers in her study for some advice about a large mole which had been damaged but didn’t feel she got a helpful answer.

Age at interview 30

Gender Female

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I had a really big mole on my back that was right by a bra strap and I kept catching it. And this had been going on for probably a few years at that point and I’d basically accidentally ripped it off actually at one point and it was quite disgusting and sort of dangling off [laugh] and I’d stuck it back down and hoped it healed. But I became quite anxious about that being something dangerous and that I could’ve started a mutation off with the cells, and I was asking the researchers, you know, What do you think I should do? Should I get it cut off, should I get it removed and I remember them being quite- well I suppose I thought it was unhelpful at the time, but they didn’t really say either way. And just kind of left it up to me about what I did with it. And yeah, I suppose that was them being neutral in their research but I remember sort of thinking-, feeling like I just wanted a bit more direction about whether it was okay or whether I should be concerned about it, and if it kept happening would something serious happen with it, mutating and sort of developing into a, into a cancerous mole.

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If family lived a long way away, they found it particularly difficult helping parents with their household and care management, including paying care bills. It helped to have a trusted local person to keep an eye on things.

Lucy has been in a study since birth. Her mum made the appointments with the researchers and this continued as she got older.

Age at interview 30

Gender Female

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So they actually came to my house every time, so it was in my living room that they would come.

And I think the appointments were just arranged by my mum, so I don’t know if she got a letter or a phone call or how that was made. But it would just be in an evening, so I didn’t miss any school. Like I say, when I was at university, we coincided it for when I was down probably in the sort of summer time or around Christmas anyway. So it was quite convenient time wise and location, just being at home, was fine too.

As you got older, was your mum still always present or was there a point at which you transitioned from you being, you know, under her care to you being the adult who they were engaging with- do you remember that transition?

Not really to be honest. I remember wanting to keep my mum in the room probably out of awkwardness rather than sort of feeling vulnerable. It was probably more embarrassment, and [laugh] it felt a bit better if she was there. But I don’t remember any sort of point when, you know, questions or the paperwork or the appointments were kind of my responsibility. I’m sure she arranged the one whilst I was away at university, just for when I got back, so she would have had that communication with them and it never really transitioned over.

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Preventing unwise spending and scams

Family members were also worried about their older relatives being scammed or over-spending. Having Lasting Power of Attorney for finances was helpful and it could also be re-assuring for the older person to know that a family member was checking their accounts.

Alan Z sees cohort studies as having an important role in understanding health in relation to lifestyle and diet.

Age at interview 86

Gender Male

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Well because throughout my life I’ve obviously heard or witnessed many sort of medical advances which even my own family have benefited from and obviously it’s all for the good of, say, everyone, you know, not just in the UK but throughout the world, these wonderful breakthroughs in medical technology are achieved and a lot of it’s done by, obviously lots and lots of painful long studies of humans and guinea pigs shall we say, and obviously they can see a pattern. I mean, I can’t think of an example but I have read where due to all, this intensive research, I suppose, like, in ongoing heart-related diseases and cancer diseases, not only is it just working in laboratories but a lot of it is done by this type of study where they get the demographics of a people or a race of people even and find out what makes them tick, something comes up they’re taking a certain type of lifestyle. Like, they hear quite often Mediterranean lifestyle where people are on a very high diet of olive oil, you know, and fruit based, vegetable based and drink probably a lot of wine, [laughs] but that’s part of it, they don’t have a highly intensive sort of fat based diet, like we in the UK do, and they seem to avoid a lot of heart-related issues.

But yeah, so, obviously, looking at all those issues they can determine certain traits and then they can narrow down onto it and, I suppose, take the study forward through doing various other measures, you know, research in laboratories etc.

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