Anyone BTDT- your aging parent has accumulated a ton of CC debt? How did you resolve
My mom was recently hospitalized and I am her POA medical/financial. I knew she had been struggling to stay on top of her finances and I have been offering to help do her finances for her but she has flat out refused in the past. She has dementia which is progessing quickly.
So now she has no choice, I have spent the week getting a handle on all of her bills, etc. It is way worse than I thought. She owes about $30-40K and a lot of what I am finding is fraudulent activity on her card that she has no idea was going on. She has also made a lot of online purchases and has been ordering things on auto-ship. Clearly not remembering what she has ordered in the past. I am trying to figure out how to resolve her debt and get the balance down. The problem is the stupid credit card companies won't even give me authority even though I am POA. I get it, there is so much fraud, but now my mom must sign an additional statement that I have authority to handle her credit card transactions, for me to pursue any of this.
I need to figure this out quickly. I am not even sure she will make it out of the hospital, but I don't want to wind up having her estate pay for all of this fraudulent activity and purchases that she clearly was making due to her dementia.
If you have been through this before, can you please share what you did? I know I can fight the fraudulent activity, but there are a bunch of these purchases made due to the dementia. Do I have to show any type of medical documentation. I am so stressed out right now trying to deal with all of this, running back and forth to the hospital, and of course my kids started school this week.
Marcy
DD1 2003
DD2 2005
DD3 2009