Reasonable expectations for my mom's lawyer?

Not clear what you are wanting to change.
Also, without currently being POA the attorney cannot speak with you about documents that are your Mother's.
Is your Mom competent?
If so, it is up to your Mother to make an appointment with HER attorney.
Then, if she wishes you to be there, she can request you accompany her.
Have Mom call for an appointment.
If, however, Mom is no longer competent, then nothing in her Trust or POA can be changed by her. And if you are not listed as POA you cannot get information. That would mean you may need to go the guardianship route.
Regular attorneys are well able to handle simple POA, looking at a Trust and etc.
So step #1. Mom calls her attorney for an appointment.
step #2. You and Mom attend the appointment with any questions, updates
and your current documents.

I recently emailed my LOs attorney to help her set up an appointment to amend one of her documents (on April 9th) and got an email back on April 18th from her assistant. So, I think expecting an immediate response is not the norm.

Also, IMO I would choose to work with a CELA (Certified Elder Law Attorney) who is well versed in the elder law, estate planning, etc. Always go with a specialist. You may also choose to contact a Medicaid Planner for your mother's state.

You should be aware that the attorney will take your mother into a room to privately interview her to assess if she's got "capacity" to create or amend the mentioned documents. You will only be invited in the meeting if she meets the standard and agrees to have you participate. This is to ensure she is not under undue pressure from others.

If your mother doesn't pass their assessment for capacity, then whatever documents she has existing will be unchangeable. She won't be able to create any new ones. FYI her memory/retention is not the deciding factor, but comprehension mostly is.

I live in MN and my 102-yr old Aunt, for whom I am DPoA is in FL. My Aunt requested I make the appointment because I'm flying down there and an appointment day/time is based on my schedule. I email her attorney with this info and include my Aunt's contact info. There is no appointment confirmed until they contact my Aunt directly and get her approval and more info about what she wishes to do at this appointment. Even though I've been to this attorney with my Aunt at least 2 times within the last 2 years, the protocol doesn't change.

If your Mom has been diagnosed with a Dementia, you may not be able to update anything. She has to be competent to sign contracts.

I have learned that with doctors and attorneys, you want to use the ones who specialize in what you need. Get a trust and estate attorney, and he should be able to have everything handled in a week or less.

Your mom has to be competent to change anything. And if she isn't it is likely that the POA has not been activated. Many POA's have a requirement of incapacity to be activated.

AND

From a post of yours on April 1,
"My mom has had caregivers in her home for 6 hours a day (2 hours in the morning, 2 in the afternoon, 2 in the evening) for a number of years. Recently we put her on temporary (we hope) round-the-clock care after a minor injury. The increase in activity in the house, many new faces, disruption to her routine, etc. has definitely had an effect on her cognition."

The attorney would not be able to change anything if this is still the case. Your profile says mom has Alzheimer's.

He's probably busy with clients who are aggressive and obnoxious. Either that or away skiing.

If I were you, I would call his office, explain what you have been waiting THREE WEEKS for (it is not aggressive or obnoxious to allow yourself to sound tight-lipped) and ask when you might expect to hear from him. If the office fobs you off with "as soon as possible" or similar indefinite answer, tell them that's not good enough and you require receipt of the paperwork by [whenever you want it by]. You don't have to spell out or else what, you can leave that to be implied, but you should bear in mind that there are other lawyers and some might be a better match for your needs.

It is par for the course, not to say the tradition of centuries, for lawyers' progress to be glacial (take for example Trollope's "Messrs Slow & Bideawhile") but there is nothing wrong with giving them the odd polite poke.

DIL56

Yes we went through the attorney evaluation of capacity with my mom. It was his call, which did not lead to success of being able to revise documents. It is said that they only need to understand "in the moment" what they are signing.

You say each attorney you spoke with, how many did you have to speak with before you found one that would do the work? Attorneys have to be very careful with this as their ethical behavior could easily be challenged and their license.

If the attorneys office is together, you will get a response for a prompt meet. It usually takes a little longer for the documents.

My suggestion is to actually go to the office since the phone call isn’t working and ask for the old documents and find a new attorney who specializes in the documents you need. You should state that you need them promptly. That shouldn’t be a problem.

The old attorney may be under staffed or not rushed. Better to find someone who is more interested.

I’m in the process of updating my paperwork and when I sent in an email on a Friday, I had an appointment the next week. The update is to make sure my daughter is on all the documents and can be familiar with the bill paying process. My husband (her father) is old school and when I told him sending checks through the mail was not good but using the bank or credit Union bill pay program assured accountability, and one never had to worry about things getting lost, he simply couldn’t remember. He would ask for refresher training every 3 to 6 months. He doesn’t pay the bills. I do. When I asked if he wanted to take over, the answer was an emphatic no, but should something happen he should know what to do. I provided an instruction sheet, but that still doesn’t click.

Only the car insurance shows up in the mail. Everything else goes to my email or bank account. House maintenance is mostly on me for big ticket items.

He manages his mother’s account as POA and it is somewhat automatic at this point, because I helped clean up his mother’s house and get it sold.The only bills are his mother’s ALF, taxes, healthcare and her dog. He is ever grateful not to have to deal with her house anymore. He is also happy to have minimal contact with her because she abused him verbally for years.

The attorney needs to respond because time is not on your side.

The advice in a previous response was good - to ask for a meeting and say that the purpose of the meeting is to review and possibly update your mother's will, POA documents, living will, trust, etc. Is your mother capable signing legal documents (of sound mind) and can she go into the office with you? You should prepare for the meeting by reviewing the documents with her and make notes about what needs to be changed. You can tell her attorney by email the items that you think should be changed. Many attorneys have gotten used to doing more by email and remotely since the pandemic. Our attorney did almost everything by sending PDFs back and forth, and we only needed to go in to do the actual signatures. If your attorney is not responsive when you have specific goals, then consider getting another attorney, perhaps one that specializes in elder law.

go directly to his office.

Maybe after each call you should follow-up with an email. For example, Good Morning (Mr) Attorney's name, Just a little follow up to my call regarding my concerns about A, B & C. I'd like to schedule a meeting with you. I'm available (whenever + times). I hope one of those days are convenient for you. I look forward to your response.

Phone calls and meetings should be followed by an email, imo. Meeting or verbalized instruction/information can be followed with an email that repeats what you understood. I'm sure someone else can write this better but something like…"Hi Attorney's name, Regarding our conversation on, date, if I understood correctly, I must [or I am, or my mom is, or we are to (do something)].

I ran to a trust/estate lawyer when a retired accountant acquaintance said to me - "Given your husband's condition you do have a trust I hope". In a pinch, a bumpy pinch, I quickly got it done. Life is so dang unpredictable. But the trust lawyer was not savvy about eldercare and special needs situation. The trust lawyer a semi young pup instructed me to now fund the trust. Okay, understood, but he said to put absolutely everything including IRA's into the trust. Thank goodness for my investment people, I didn't include those.

A little question please, why is the lawyer a co-trustee? Could you have meant a successor trustee?

I mentioned bumpy in my above third paragraph because I dealt with two different lawyers. Since we don't have any family I had to ask if the lawyer would stand in for me as (successor) trustee to take care of my husband's - placement (it's not time yet right now while I'm alive), his care and bills should I die tomorrow. This first lawyer agreed and wrote the most convoluted bunch of documents that made me think that I've really dumbed down more than I thought. Hidden among the reams of pages he over reached in a way that would allow him, after my signing and then death, to tap into funds for himself beyond what should be exclusively used for my husband's care and for the agreed fee's for hours spent doing paperwork for my husband's bills and for the time spent (I could only hope) for the occasional visit and checking up on my institutionalized LO.

The first lawyer charged $3,000.00, down payment for the initial draft of the boiler-plate-on-steroids new will, POA, MPO, etc., that I couldn't read past the very 3rd page. I got suspicious and so the second lawyer. He cost me an addition $5,000.00 in total for the same but super customized, concise, tidy, easily understood documents, but as I said, this new, good guy, estate & trust, young-pup, lawyer's instructions about funding my and my husband's IRA's into the trust was a tad wrong. He is a successor trustee after me. Who knows, maybe he wanted to make things easier for himself.

Anyway...If I understand the investment brokers correctly, the IRA of a deceased spouse can be rolled over into the survivoring spouse/beneficiary's IRA, and not taxed, only if it is left as is and not held (not funded) in a trust. Otherwise, if our IRA's are placed (funded into or) inside the trust, those funds will still go to the survivor BUT only after it's been taxed to smithereens.

Sorry, you may know all this already. I'm still blown away at all the things I've got to know that can only be known from several separate and different sources that have to do with the same one darn thing. Whose idea was this?

You are the boss. A polite boss. And this is very important business. You can't ask too many questions, too often, and from too many different people. Repeat back to ensure clarity. Being deferential in this case is like bending over in front of a bull.

You don't say if your mother is competent to make decisions such as arranging for another attorney nor whether you are a general or financial POA agent. I imagine you wouldn't have posted your question if you could simply have hired another attorney. If you continue trying and getting nowhere, consider first writing a Return Receipt Requested letter asking why he has not gotten back to you and why you want to talk to him. If that goes nowhere (and give it a week) give a call to his local attorney professional ethics office. Here it is called the Office of Attorney Regulation. Tell them what is happening. I assure you that this will get his attention. I also wonder about him being a co-trustee of a trust that he probably drafted. It isn't illegal but I would mention that to the professional ethics office as well. This guy sounds like a bad egg or a disorganized mess. Get rid of him if you can.

GB2112: Perhaps you can schedule an in office visit with your mother's attorney.

Go to his office if you can

He is probably focusing on other cases, so your mom's is probably on the "back burner"

He seems in dire need of an office manager. Find somebody you can make an appointment with to get those documents created. Whichever lawyer you use should have some standard versions of these documents so it can be pretty much a 1 visit affair.

Id leave a voice mail or email even better and state how many times you contacted him. You will give him 3 days to contact him, or you are going to another lawyer bc you need this handled immediately.
An email you have it in writing if he says he didn't get it, didn't know etc.
You clearly warned him. Has he been paid for his other services? Maybe he thinks you think he is supposed to do this for nothing or a courtesy. You never know. Good luck.