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There are many sources of free legal information and advice; for example, you may be able to find the information you need through a helpline or on the internet. In some situations you will need to see a solicitor, but you may be able to get the help you need from an advice agency or another organisation.
One of the commonest reasons older people look for legal advice is to set up formal arrangements to organise their affairs. These include Wills‚ to establish what happens to your estate after your death; estate planning during your lifetime‚ to minimise tax liabilities and achieve any other objectives you have; and arrangements to manage your affairs if you no longer have the mental capacity to do so yourself.
As a general rule you do not need a solicitor to validate any formal documentation but you should consider how comfortable you are dealing with these matters and also what the consequences will be if you make a mistake. Solicitors and other professionals usually have insurance that you can claim against if they commit an error. If you do the work yourself‚ you will not have this protection.
Advice agencies: You may not need to go to a solicitor to get the advice and assistance you need. Using a solicitor can be very expensive. A general advice agency such as your local Age Concern or Age UK, Citizens Advice Bureau‚ or another independent advice agency‚ may be able to provide free information and advice to help you resolve your problem. They can sometimes also provide specialist advice and representation. If not‚ they should be able to refer you on to someone else who can help.
Trade unions: If you are a member of a trade union you may be able to get free legal advice through the union‚ and not just on issues relating to your employment. You should contact your union to find out what they can offer.
Financial advice: Access to legal advice is also offered as a benefit of some bank accounts‚ insurance policies and other products. Check the terms and conditions of any you hold to see whether you qualify for such a service.
Law Centres: Law Centres provide free independent legal advice from solicitors‚ in areas of social welfare law such as welfare rights‚ discrimination law‚ housing‚ employment and community care.
Download the Getting legal advice factsheet (PDF 292 KB)
Set your location to see what Age UK offers in your local area.
An information guide with more in-depth advice about how to get the most appropriate legal advice and what to expect from a legal adviser.
Downloads
A download is a document (like a research report, a leaflet, or an application form) that can be transferred from our website to your computer. You can download a file, view it on your screen, print it, or save it to your computer.
PDF stands for ‘portable document format’.
Most downloads on this website are PDFs. We use this format to ensure that the document looks the same on everyone’s computer (website pages, by contrast, appear differently depending on how people have set their computer up).
Computers use a program called Adobe Acrobat Reader to download PDFs. If you try clicking on a link to download a PDF and it doesn’t work, you will need to install Adobe Acrobat Reader onto your computer.
The process is quite straightforward and is free.
PDFs cannot be changed. If you need to be able to type into a downloaded document (for example, if we are offering a letter template that you need to put your name on) we will provide it as a Microsoft Word document rather than a PDF. You can then download it, type into it and save it to your computer.
Downloads will open on your computer in a new browser window.
Inside this window (below all your web browser menus), there will be a toolbar with options for you to print or save the document.
Close the browser window to return to the Age UK website.
We have made every effort to make our PDFs accessible to screen readers. Here is an overview of your accessibility options available in Acrobat Reader. Please ensure that you have downloaded the latest version of Acrobat Reader from the Adobe Reader website to ensure that they are included in your version of the programme.
You can use Adobe Reader to read a PDF out loud with the following shortcut keys:
You can also convert a PDF into a web page by following these steps:
You can convert a PDF document into a text file for use with other software and hardware such as Braille printers by opening the PDF and choosing ‘Save as text’ from the File menu.
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