Financial elder abuse: How accountants, bookkeepers can help break the cycle

On a recent Under the Hood podcast episode, Smith shared why the topic needed to be more widely acknowledged and how financial professionals could help stop it in its tracks, as more seniors and elders were financially disadvantaged by those around them.

Smith said elder financial abuse refers to the action of people tapping into an elderly person’s finances without their knowledge or by deception to gain an advantage.

It was noted by Smith that this kind of abuse usually appeared in estate planning, physically stealing cash, overcharging on services or taking up guardianship.

“I think as accountants and bookkeepers, we might not be at the stage of signing over assets like houses which sit with lawyers, but there is awareness and conversations we can have,” she said.

“We need to be aware and we need to have these conversations to slow something down, put people on the right track and put them in touch with people who can provide proper support.”

Smith added it was important to understand elder financial abuse wasn’t always obvious and didn’t involve an older woman turning up to an office with a black eye. 

Instead, it could involve someone who had no idea it was happening or was confused about what could be happening, if they were in cognitive decline.

“I think a common misconception is that this just happens occasionally and we’re not sure if it does happen, or we’re not sure when someone arrives in our office whether there’s an issue or not. So, we’re kind of slightly uncertain and we’re not certain actually what to do,” Smith said.

“One of the things I would say to accountants and bookkeepers is that our superpower is ethics and integrity. Use that in your branding, use that in your marketing and make it very clear that you’re a professional, and you will ask questions.”

It was noted that the accounting community needed to be more in tune with education coming from membership bodies, as well as real-life stories and case studies of others’ experiences to help everyone gain a perspective and game plan against elder financial abuse.

Smith said a helpful mechanism for dealing with a suspicious interaction was to separate an older person from the younger individual who may be driving or controlling a financial conversation involving an elder’s financials, to ensure there was no foul play or level of confusion with the proceedings.

“We harp on about the importance of relationships and this is definitely something you should be looking out for if you’ve had a long-term client – this awareness and protection is about taking care of them and taking care of that relationship.”