Who Can Get It, and How

The most secure arrangement is one nobody can use, and a client who finds access difficult quietly starts keeping things at home. Real security is the arrangement that is both controlled and convenient enough to actually survive contact with a normal life.

The awkward cases are the ones worth deciding in advance. A family member arriving unexpectedly, a request made by telephone, an urgent need while the owner is traveling — each will happen eventually, and the time to establish the answer is when nobody is under pressure.

• By appointment, so items are retrieved and ready.
• Authority you set, in writing, and can revoke at any time.
• Third parties — a broker, an appraiser, a family member — on your authority only.
• Every access logged, with who, when and what.
• Condition re-checked on return.

Review it annually. Relationships change, advisers change, staff leave, and an out-of-date authority is a risk that costs nothing to remove and is almost never remembered until it matters.

It is also worth being explicit about what each authorized person may do — view, collect, or instruct — because those are different permissions and they are frequently granted as though they were one.

1. 01Set up written authority and maintain it as you change it.
2. 02Retrieve items ahead of an appointment.
3. 03Admit nobody without documented authority.
4. 04Log every access and provide the log on request.
5. 05Re-check and re-record condition on every return.

Review your authorized list once a year. Relationships change, staff leave, and an out-of-date authority is the kind of risk that costs nothing to remove and is almost never remembered until it matters.

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