Free Wisconsin Non-Durable (General) Power of Attorney Form

Wisconsin is the only state in this family with a full remote signing procedure written into its statute. A Wisconsin Non-Durable (General) Power of Attorney gives an agent authority over your financial affairs and states expressly that the authority ends on your incapacity. Chapter 244 of the Wisconsin Statutes, the Uniform Power of Attorney for Finances and Property, governs it.

Five things, and the signing rules have been tightened twice since the chapter arrived.

Who May Sign for You

Section 244.05(1) requires you to sign the document, or an individual 18 years of age or older, at your express direction and in your physical presence, to sign your name on it. Note physical presence. The chapter originally said conscious presence, and Wisconsin has since narrowed both that phrase and the age of the person who may sign for you, so an arrangement that worked for an older document may not work now.

The Notary Earns a Presumption

Under subsection (2), your signature, or the signature of an individual signing on your behalf, is presumed to be genuine where you make an acknowledgment of the document before a notarial officer authorized under chapter 140 to take acknowledgments. Wisconsin also moved that cross-reference: it used to point at section 706.07, and now points at chapter 140. Notarization is not what makes the document valid here, but it is what makes a bank comfortable, so treat it as part of the job.

Saying It Ends at Incapacity

Section 244.04 runs to one sentence, and it begins from durability: a document made under the chapter stays durable unless it expressly provides for termination on the principal’s incapacity. Nothing happens unless you write that in, and the sentence should sit in the document itself rather than in a covering letter or an instruction to your agent.

Set a Second Limit Too

An incapacity clause and an end date do different work, and a short-term document benefits from both. The incapacity provision handles the case you cannot predict. A date or a defined task handles the case you can, and it gives your agent and any third party something they can check without needing to form a view about your health.

A Guardian Does Not End It

Section 244.08(2) is worth knowing before you sign. Where a court later appoints a conservator or guardian of your estate, your agent becomes accountable to that fiduciary as well as to you, but the power of attorney is not terminated and your agent’s authority continues unless the court limits, suspends or terminates it.

Yes, and Wisconsin sets out the whole procedure rather than leaving it to a notary platform. Section 244.05(3) describes a remote execution involving two remote witnesses and a supervising attorney, connected by two-way real-time audiovisual communication.

The mechanics are unusually physical for something described as remote. You, or the individual signing at your direction, sign in a manner that allows each of the remote witnesses and the supervising attorney to see the execution. The original document then travels: it goes to the first remote witness, who signs it as a witness and forwards the entire signed original by personal delivery, U.S. mail or commercial courier within a reasonable time to the second remote witness, who signs and forwards it to the supervising attorney. The section also prescribes a certificate recording that the execution happened via remote appearance by two-way, real-time communication.

That chain is worth understanding before you choose the route. A Wisconsin Non-Durable (General) Power of Attorney signed this way is not finished when the video call ends. One paper original has to reach three more people in sequence, and until it does the document is not complete.

If everyone can be in one room, the ordinary route under subsections (1) and (2) is faster and involves nobody but you and a notarial officer.

1. Fill in your agent and any successor, and spell out what they are authorized to do.
2. Write the express provision terminating the document on your incapacity, as section 244.04 requires.
3. Set a finish line: a calendar date, or the transaction the document exists to complete.
4. Decide between signing in person and the remote procedure in section 244.05(3).
5. If someone signs for you, check they are 18 or older and physically present with you.
6. Sign, then acknowledge the signature before a notarial officer authorized under chapter 140.
7. If you used the remote route, track the original through both witnesses and the supervising attorney.

A complete Wisconsin Non-Durable (General) Power of Attorney carries:

• Your name and address, and your agent’s
• Any successor agent
• The authority granted, itemized
• The express provision terminating it on your incapacity
• An end date or defined task
• Your signature and the notarial acknowledgment
• Where signed remotely, both witness signatures and the supervising attorney’s certificate