When a family member is no longer able to make decisions for themselves, the practical difficulties tend to arrive quite quickly. The bank will not discuss your family member’s accounts, the care facility needs someone to sign documents, and the bills keep arriving with nobody holding the authority to pay them.
Being a spouse, or an adult child, does not by itself give you that authority. If your mother, father, or partner did not sign an enduring power of attorney while they were still able to, the only way to obtain it is to apply to the Family Court under the Protection of Personal and Property Rights Act 1988.
There are two different appointments available, and which one you need, or whether you need both, is the first thing to work out.
Decisions about a person, and decisions about their money
The Act treats these separately.
A Welfare Guardian makes decisions about personal care and welfare, which covers where your family member lives, what medical treatment they receive, and how they are cared for day to day. Decisions about assets, income, and expenses are made instead by a Property Administrator or a Property Manager.
Property here means a good deal more than the house. It covers bank accounts and savings, term deposits and investments, a vehicle, superannuation and any other income, and it includes debts such as a mortgage or a credit card.
Most families we act for apply for both at the same time, and there is no difficulty in doing so, but the Court does consider each application on its own terms.
Applying to be appointed a Welfare Guardian
The threshold for this appointment is a high one. Before the Court will appoint a Welfare Guardian, it must be satisfied that your family member wholly lacks the ability to understand decisions about some aspect of their personal care and welfare, or is wholly unable to communicate decisions about it, and that appointing a guardian is the only satisfactory way of making sure those decisions are made properly.
Partial incapacity will not be enough, and if your family member is still able to make some decisions with support from those around them, the Court is more likely to make a narrower order dealing only with the particular issue in front of it.
Only an individual aged 20 or over may be appointed as a Welfare Guardian, so a company or a trust cannot take on this role. The Court will also need to be satisfied that you are capable of carrying out the duties involved, that no conflict of interest is likely to arise, that you consent to the appointment, and that you will act in the best interests of the person concerned.
There are some decisions that remain outside a Welfare Guardian’s authority, including consenting to marriage or its dissolution, to adoption, and to certain medical procedures. A Welfare Guardian is also unable to refuse consent to standard life saving treatment.
Applying to be appointed a Property Administrator or Property Manager
Which property application we make for you will depend on how much your family member owns, and what income they have coming in.
The Act refers to your family member as the subject person, and you will see that term used in the paperwork. Where no single item of the subject person’s property is worth more than $25,000, and their income or benefit for the year falls below the current threshold, we can apply for an order to administer property, and you would be appointed as the Property Administrator. The income threshold is $41,200 for orders made between 1 April 2026 and 31 March 2027, and it increases each April. This is the simpler of the two applications, with less paperwork and lower ongoing costs.
If the property or the income sits above those figures, we would instead apply for a property order to appoint a Property Manager. The test is a less demanding one than for welfare guardianship, as your family member need only lack, wholly or partly, the competence to manage their own affairs in relation to their property.
A family member aged 20 or over can be appointed, and so can a trustee corporation. A trustee corporation is often worth considering where your family member’s financial affairs are complicated, or where nobody in the family particularly wants to take on the record keeping and the yearly reporting.
If capacity has not yet been lost
None of this is necessary where your family member still has capacity. Enduring powers of attorney are considerably quicker and less expensive than any application to the Family Court, and they can be prepared without much difficulty at all. The trouble is that people tend to put it off, and capacity is not always lost slowly.
If an application is the only option left, our second article sets out what we will need from you, how long the process takes, and what the role asks of you once the orders are made, which you can read here.
If you would like to talk through which application would suit your situation, get in touch with our experts.
This information is general and current as at September 2026 and is not a substitute for advice on your own circumstances.
