Capacity is the ability of a person to make their own decisions and understand exactly what they are doing. When signing legal documents, a person needs to have capacity to ensure they understand the document that they are signing.
Often when a person’s capacity is queried, in order to sign any documents, they will need a doctor’s certificate to confirm that they have capacity to sign. A doctor or other specialised medical professional is qualified in making assessments as to capacity. As legal experts, we are not qualified to make this determination.
Obtaining a doctor’s certificate is protection to ensure that if a person’s capacity is queried in future, the certificate can be produced at a later date as evidence that they had capacity at the time of signing the document.
If it is doubtful as to whether someone had capacity at the time of signing a document, the legitimacy of the document could be up for debate. This is an issue as the documents may be considered invalid and the documents will have no effect.
