British Diana (asker) Oct 6, 2021:

Great discussion which clears up a lot of terms! Thanks to all who contributed.

AllegroTrans Oct 5, 2021:

A power of attorney... is a formal legal document which the vast majority of people would not write themselves - they would go to a lawyer.
A signed authority is usually no more than a simple form or letter.
These are two totally different documents, even if they confer the same authority. For one thing the donor's signature on a POA has to be witnessed and the wording has to very explicit and comply with national law.
See: https://info.legalzoom.com/article/differences-between-a-pow...

Susan Starling Oct 1, 2021:

POA = a signed authority AllegroTrans writes (below, where I'm unable to add a response) that "a POA and a signed authority are two different things but German does not make that distinction; we do". I wouldn't agree that a POA and a signed authority are two different things, at least not in general speech, which is what has been asked for here: "A power of attorney (POA) is a document that allows you to appoint a person or organization to manage your property, financial, or medical affairs if you become unable to do so." (from Legalzoom, but look anywhere). And even if a distinction were to be made, the asker has asked what we'd say for "Vollmacht geben" in informal speech, and in my opinion the most direct equivalent would be to "sign a power of attorney". I don't insist that everyone adhere to my opinion of course; I'm merely providing it as an option as I don't believe "they asked you to authorise me to..." is quite sufficient. Because what's the next question her friend would ask? Probably something like "Well how do you authorise me?" "By signing a power of attorney". It's simply necessary information IMO. FWIW!

Susan Starling Sep 30, 2021:

Proxy Exactly, proxy is what's used in a voting context. And I agree, in US English we wouldn't say "she gave me authority to blablabla" in a casual context either. But we would indeed say "She signed a power of attorney so I could blablabla" (see post).

British Diana (asker) Sep 29, 2021:

Thank you, everyone! I must say I was thinking along these lines myself, as I couldn't imagine ordinary people saying things like "she gave me authority to pick up the ID card for her".
It might be off-topic but when do we use "proxy"? Presumably not in my case. Is it for things like voting on someone's behalf?

Steffen Walter Sep 29, 2021:

Yes, that's also a possibility ... ... and the preceding officer's sentence (which I had actually focused on) can be rendered as "Of course you can. You just need to get/obtain Ms M's written permission".

Ramey Rieger (X) Sep 29, 2021:

in writing/written I've got her written permission...quite casual

Steffen Walter Sep 29, 2021:

Yes, along these lines She just needs to write a letter to authorise you.
She just needs to authorise you in writing.

Steve Robbie Sep 29, 2021:

I think ... ... that in English we would describe it differently, e.g. "She signed a form / wrote a letter to allow me to collect it for her."
Of course, that requires you to know which of those two things she actually did.