Missing Ashes

rbsn

My mum in law died 6 months ago & we recently went to collect her ashes but the funeral home cannot locate them and they have barely apologised saying they are continuing with their search but how long do we wait and where do we go from here, any advice would be welcome. Thank You.

TBagpuss

Oh dear, that must be very distressing.

I would suggest in the first instance that you wrote a formal letter of complaint, asking them to explain how this has happened, and what steps they have already taken and are planning to take to find her ashes.

Check whether the funeral home is part of any trade body - if they are, then there may be an ombudsman or arbitration service you can contact for help. (see http://www.uk-funerals.co.uk/funeral-trade-groups.html)

SevenOfNine

The ashes container box is EXTREMELY well labelled. You'd have to be a complete moron to hand them to the wrong family, & equally stupid to be a family that accepts the wrong box!

So the odds that they've been permanently 'lost' are slim, but it's callous & careless for the FD not to pull their finger out to turn their premises upside down immediately in an attempt to find them.

Personally, I'd contact the crematorium & tell them what has happened & ask if they have any paperwork that can help you show they were delivered to the funeral director, & to what address. Also draws the crems attention to what has happened, not their fault of course but they may not be happy with a careless FD.

FD's often have more than one branch, so it's possible they have gone to the wrong premises, though the FD should check that themselves, won't hurt to do a little hunting yourself - put them to shame.

Are you sure without a shred of doubt that a family member hasn't already collected them? They aren't 'signed' for ordinarily, you just waltz in & ask for them & they're handed over (something that's always surprised me).

Who is the owner of this company?

Savvy_Sue

I think it would be worth knowing too what the process is for keeping in touch with families about ashes. The FD we used was happy to hang on to Dad's ashes, he made it sound as if it would be OK almost indefinitely, as he died in the winter and we were going to bury his ashes at a natural burial ground. The FD's advice was not to rush this, as "it's a lovely place when the sun is shining ..."

However, a friend was slightly shocked to get a letter soon after their spouse's funeral asking when the ashes would be collected and stating that they would not be stored for longer than - I think - 6 months.

mum_of_joey

This is a terrible situation for the relatives. Hopefully, they will be located shortly. My mother was very distressed when her sister's ashes were somehow put on a mail train some 20-odd years ago. The ashes went up and down the country, which we could never understand, and they eventually ended up with my mother after many weeks. (She lived in a different part of the country to my auntie, but they both lived in the south of England, so what they were doing up North is a puzzle to me.)

We got an explanation but no real apology. They just turned up weeks after they were due, after mum anxiously asking where they were. Not meaning to make light of it, as it was very distressing to my mum, because my auntie liked travelling around to different places, we tried to see it as my auntie's last 'jaunt' around the country!

There really should be a lot tighter procedures at the funeral home that has lost this person's ashes, with more than one person dealing with them at every stage. The mental relief at having your loved one's ashes in front of you cannot be over-estimated. Even having my dog's ashes finally with me after many weeks elsewhere (he had to have a post-mortem at a teaching vet school) was a blessed relief. It's all part of closure.