The Cost of Funerals

bookerpa

I was out of the country when my mother died and my brother arranged Mum's funeral. He arranged Mum's funeral with our local (and only) funeral director and in 2004 the cost was £1800. This was for all the usual FD services, the hearse (no other cars), cremation, and then Mum wanted her ashes to be buried in her mother's grave at a local cemetery. In 2010, our father died and my brother and I arranged Dad's funeral (again with a local FD but in a different town). Same as for Mum but without Dad's ashes being buried. The cost was £3300! I was absolutely flabergasted how much the cost had risen over the six years and so decided that I would get a funeral plan for myself saving my husband and daughter all the hassle and worry after I have gone. The cost of the plan with The Co-operative is £2700 (so I thought I was getting quite a good deal). HOWEVER, had I known that I could opt for a municipal funeral, then that is was I would have gone for, and for my husband and daughter to have enjoyed a few drinks to celebrate my life. Just shows the 'mark up'. Don't get me wrong, both funerals were dignified but FDs are supposed to provide a dignified service.:A

mioliere

So sorry for your sad loss.

I have recently helped my mum to plan her funeral simply because she really wanted to 'get it sorted'. It cost £3,000. She wanted exactly the same funeral that we had for my dad in 1969, so we went to same funeral directors' and they still had the records, which they kindly photocopied for us. His funeral cost £67.

hilstep2000

I have just paid for my Dad's funeral. It was a pre-paid one. He has chosen all the songs, readings etc. The whole cost was £5746. Which seems a lot, but he wants to be buried with my Mamma, and the plot is in Morden, South London. we live in Hastings, so as he is no longer a resident of Wandsworth we have to pay extra. However, when my Mamma died five years ago the cost was £4000 so I don't think that's bad. We won't have to pay any more, and Daddy has made all the decisions.

floss2

Just want to make everyone aware that what other posters are referring to as "municipal" funerals are more generally known as "public health" funerals.

This is information from Oldham Council's website.

For those who think this is a great way to avoid paying for a funeral, please note the following excert from that website:

If details about family and friends are found, they will be told about the death and asked them if they want to make the funeral arrangements.

If a will is found the executor (the person who will be responsible for looking after your estate when you die) will be asked to make the funeral arrangements in line with the deceased person’s wishes. The council will then take no further action.

Who pays for the funeral?
The cost of the funeral is normally paid for using the money from the deceased persons estate. (A person’s estate is all the belongings you own when you die). If there isn’t enough money in their estate to meet the costs, the executor of the will is personally responsible.

If the deceased person has not made a will the person who is arranging the funeral (normally the next of kin) is responsible for the funeral costs.

Some funeral directors may offer a "budget" option that is equivalent to the service provided to the local Council, but they are under non obligation to offer this. Also, this will involve cremation/burial at your local crematorium or cemetery, rather than the "nice one in the next town/county" as that will be out of area.

[Deleted User]

I have told my two DDs that when I pop my clogs not to spend more than they have to, or I will return and haunt them I have been sensible with my cash all of my life and I definitely don't want flowers, as I'd rather have them whilst I'm alive .

When my late OH died we said that we didn't want flowers as my DDs and I were doing one wreath and anything left over was to go to the Friends of The Hospital where he died as they were so good to us all during the dreadful time to both my DDs, and we raised almost 1K for them, and I am pleased that they had it rather than just blowing away in a crematorium somehwere.
It did far more good and its what my OH always wanted.Death indeed comes to us all and the wake afterwards we arranged at my eldest Dds house.Everyone who was there said how nice it was that we celebrated his life and everyone had a story about how he had been to them when they knew him.He was a big hearted laughing man who would give you his last halfpenny and one of my friends husbands said "Alan would have loved this, as he loved a party" I said "Well he is in a way the guest of honour, and this is a party for him"
Sad though it was to lose him, we still talk about his 'send off' and how much he would have enjoyed it all. Folk turned up from miles away whom we hadn't seen for years just to say their goodbyes which I though was brilliant
It was almost 10 years ago and if I recalled it cost around £2k then and he was seen off with dignity by a small local family firm who couldn't have been kinder to me or my family

Austin_Allegro

One way of offsetting costs is to have a funeral plan - organisations like the Co-Op allow you to pay for your funeral in advance.

It might sound morbid but it makes sense because what you pay now is what you pay for your funeral, even if it is years in the future, so your money is not affected by inflation.

It is also a useful way for people who are approaching the limit on savings for benefit eligibility to offload some cash.

You don't need to go through an undertaker or have a funeral, and can arrange a cremation directly with a crematorium.

You don't have to have a vicar at a cremation or any kind of ceremony.

I am not entirely sure about this next bit but I am pretty certain that the funeral service, in the CofE at least, is not a sacrament (something that can only be performed by an ordained minister, like a wedding) and any layperson can read the funeral service from the Book of Common Prayer (or its modern equivalent or anything else suitable) at a funeral or dispersal, but a crematorium would be able to advise on this.

(It's usually best if you do have a qualified person though as they will ensure everything goes smoothly.)

Figgerty

Jojo_the_Tightfisted wrote: »

The local funeral directors say mourners are not permitted at their cheap/basics/simple funerals and nobody may view the body at all.

Who wants a funeral where nobody is allowed to attend or view the body? This sounds like what I imagined a paupers funeral would be like.

Figgerty

floss2 wrote: »

Just want to make everyone aware that what other posters are referring to as "municipal" funerals are more generally known as "public health" funerals.

This is information from Oldham Council's website.

For those who think this is a great way to avoid paying for a funeral, please note the following excert from that website:

If details about family and friends are found, they will be told about the death and asked them if they want to make the funeral arrangements.

If a will is found the executor (the person who will be responsible for looking after your estate when you die) will be asked to make the funeral arrangements in line with the deceased person’s wishes. The council will then take no further action.

Who pays for the funeral?
The cost of the funeral is normally paid for using the money from the deceased persons estate. (A person’s estate is all the belongings you own when you die). If there isn’t enough money in their estate to meet the costs, the executor of the will is personally responsible.

If the deceased person has not made a will the person who is arranging the funeral (normally the next of kin) is responsible for the funeral costs.

Some funeral directors may offer a "budget" option that is equivalent to the service provided to the local Council, but they are under non obligation to offer this. Also, this will involve cremation/burial at your local crematorium or cemetery, rather than the "nice one in the next town/county" as that will be out of area.

This is what my Borough says - no mention of FD's providing a basic low cost funeral.
Municipal funerals

The law places a duty on local authorities to deal with the funeral arrangements where a person dies within the borough and there is no one else willing or able to do so (where the person was living at the date of their death is not relevant).

The only exception is where the person died in hospital, in which case the health authority is responsible for making the appropriate arrangements. The law also requires that the local authority recovers their costs.
The council would only get involved if someone dies within the borough and there was no one else willing or able to make the funeral arrangements. A referral letter is received from a Coroners Officer, hospice, residential home or hospital (if pronounced dead before admission).
If a family makes a referral they are advised that the funeral is the first claim on the estate and therefore the Borough would endeavour to recover costs.

The_FD

I think it needs to be explained that the municipal funeral referred to by several posters is the same as a paupers funeral. This is only an option if there is no money, or no one is willing to take the responsibility for the funeral costs. It is not an option for the vast majority of people. It is not something that people can just choose to have to save them paying for the funeral!!

The DWP will make funeral contributions for families who are on benefits - but they will not cover the full costs. There is usually a short fall of £1000 plus. But please be aware that the DWP have tightened up who they will give money to.

There are many types of funeral plans available. Most will not guarantee the disbursements (crematorium/cemetery/newspapers/flowers etc). The extra (if there is any) will need to still be paid for by the family. One poster above described their parents paying for 25 years. This is an insurance policy. You pay so much each month, and have to continue doing so for the rest of your days or else you lose the lot. It is not a good way of doing things, as you will often pay more than the total cost if you live for a long time.

Please also be aware that the cost of funeral is made up of two parts. The funeral directors fees, and the disbursements. The funeral director has no control over these. To compare the costs of funerals is not always fair as there are so many parts which some are covering and others are not. For example, the type of coffin (solid wood/veneer), if there are cars required for the family, if there is a church service prior to the cremation or burial (the funeral director will need to charge extra for their time and men required), if there is viewing (out of hours?), embalming would also be recommended; in the disbursements was a newspaper notice included (these vary from £50 in local papers to £500 in the national broadsheets), were flowers included (the sky is your limit), was the catering afterwards also included (again this can be a massive cost).

Cardboard coffins are often suggested as a cheap alternative - they are more expensive than a simple wood veneer for a funeral director to buy. It is often stated they are more environmentally friendly, but they are made in china and flown half way round the world - there are many air miles as a result. Veneer coffins are FSC controlled wood, made locally.

rospax

My sister & I had to arrange my mum's funeral - a cremation - last year. What made me really angry was that after the fact I realised we had been emotionally cajoled into agreeing to all kinds of things we didn't really want. There was a poor choice of 'Eco' coffins and no real price savings whatever we selected - it was as if they had decided a price for a funeral and would charge it whatever. We didn't want mum taken to a chapel of rest for viewing, we didn't want her embalmed but the undertaker said we had no choice and it wouldn't reduce the bill because they threw it in automatically, and anyway it was for the safety if his staff...which I've since found out is total rubbish! The funeral was literally days after her death, she died of old age and Alzheimer's, not some infectious disease, and her body was basically reduced to a piece of meat that could be stored briefly in a refrigerator. I mean, bodies used to lie in the front room before we buried them! Sorry, no intention to offend anyone there but that's kind of my point - we are taught to treat death with such fear and distaste that if we challenge any of the accepted social mores, we are talked down to as if somehow we are an awful, money-grabbing family who has no care for our deceased relative and just wants to pack them off the cheapest way. Nothing could be further from the truth. Yet they shame you into spending money at a time when you're in a really vulnerable state. In the end we chose a wicker casket, as "cardboard" or "flat pack" options were not available from this particular firm, and we did have to pay for embalming and the chapel of rest, even though nobody visited her there (honestly, we didn't need to see her like that after watching her shrink away into a tiny, dessicated feather and float off from us...) and the whole thing cost about 3.5 grand, for a funeral attended by about a dozen people (we're a small & spread out family and she was the last of her generation and friends) - no big flowers, wake at my house, catering by me from the supermarket. That's a Surrey address for you though - I bet funerals don't cost quite this much in other parts of the country. I think some journalist should do an investigation into undertakers and really examine how those costs are made up. They have us over a barrel and are raking in the money if you ask me. Personally I'd say £1000 is about right for a box, a couple of car journeys and a bit of lifting. The rest is just unnecessary gloss and doesn't improve anyone's life, or passing, simply leaves the survivors all the poorer. Oh, and by the way, if you're going for cremation and they ask you what you want to do with your loved one's prosthetic knees and hips, don't just say deal with them however you usually do. Yes, they will be recycled by the Crem (titanium survives the heat of cremation), but if you ask for them back you can always sell the scrap metal yourself and put that towards the funeral costs. I knew somebody who kept an artificial hip as a paperweight!