Pre Paid Funeral Plan advice/recommendation please

My Nan did hers through Age Concern.
She said they were very helpful and not at all pushy. (She hates pushy people).
She's very happy with what she has arranged!
According to her she gets the funeral that she wants NOT what we think she would want. (Iyswim)

Must add, Nan is on her road to 92 and made her arrangements years ago!

Hope that helps.

Squibbs

For anyone that has a pre-paid plan, just be aware that there may be additions/reductions when the time comes. Eg - I did a funeral once and as they had a pre-plan, it gave an allowance of £50 for the ministers fee. As this was for a church member, I did not charge (at our church the fee goes to the church and not to me anyway). If I had not taken this up with the FD, then the family would not have got £50 reimbursed.
Also, £50 for a ministers fee would not cover it (most that I know charge in excess of £100 - some double that).

I am not at all happy with the CO-OP and especially their funeralcare package.

Unfortunately my father died last week, fortunately he and my mother had been given the peace of mind of knowing that their funerals would be paid for when they died because they both decided to start paying into a funeralcare plan in 2007.

Combined they had been paying over two hundreds into separate plans, both providing the Bronze level of cover. Now that my father has died his plan (worth just under £1000) will be used but my mother has been landed with the difference to pay (with two extra cars following the main hearse, this difference is £1500).

Worst still the CO-OP insist that the money must be paid in full (because it is a funeralcare plan) by this saturday. My mother just doesn't have this kind of money and although she is expecting a life/endowment policy worth about £2000 to pay out as my father has died she won't get the money for weeks I'm sure.

I do have a small amount of savings that could be used to pay the difference, but it seems grossly unfair when you consider that another person we know of had a funeral arranged through the CO-OP and they had to pay a £800 deposit but could then pay the balance 30 days after the funeral.

I also asked the Funercare helpline if my mum's policy could be transferred to my father.... NO!! they said... so I then asked can the plan be cancelled... "Yes it can and you would get the money back that has been paid in..... but we will charge you a £100 administration fee"..

Unfortunately I have had to leave the main funeral arrangements to my mother and sister as I am unable to get to the local CO-OP undertakers office during the day... but they seem to be quite rigid when it comes to the plans. I also want to know why the funeral care helpline said that extra cars cost £150 whereas my mother is being charged £180 each!!

I can see the benefits of the schemes (if you pay for your plan in full and then live for a number of years), in a way you are guaranteeing a certain level of funeral, but in my mother/father's case they have been quite restricted and effectively tied to using the CO-OP. My mum now wishes she had just saved the money in a joint bank account and then she would have been able to do what she wanted with it now without all these added complications.

floss2 wrote: »

We had to wait for an insurance payout and also for probate for my mum's estate before we could pay the balance of the bill - our local Funeralcare were told it would be paid when probate was granted and there was nothing we could do about it, as we weren't in a position to pay. Perhaps that would be an option?

Also, most employers are pretty reasonable when an employee is dealing with an estate as probate office, solicitors etc are not open at weekends - maybe you could take a couple of hours extension to a lunchtime & visit the branch with your mum to clarify things?

I think I'll give their main help line a call tomorrow... depends what time I get home - unfortunately the work I do makes it very difficult to take time out at the moment.

I personally think it's really poor how my mum has been treated after she and my dad just tried to do the right thing and plan for the future. It's the penalties in this plan and the pay up front or else attitude that has really annoyed me. On the one hand I want to argue this and on the other my mum just wants to get the whole thing done with the minimum of fuss, afterall losing my father has been a traumatic enough experience anyway - she is worried that the CO-OP will almost hold us to ransom over the dates or worse still cancel the one that has been reserved.

When my mother had a stroke 4 years ago she said she wanted to take out a funeral plan and used the same firm that dealt with my dads funeral-just a small local family firm. They were very good then so she was happy to use them again.
All she needed to do was state that she wanted to be cremated and which hymns she wanted at the service so when the time comes myself and my brother don't need to worry about anything like that.
It's all been paid for and she's happy knowing that everythings sorted out.