Summarised from a market report entitled 'Funeral plans - it still pays to shop around' prepared by Funeral Planning Services (Feb '97).
The charity Age Concern has long recognised the benefits of a funeral pre-payment plan for those people, mainly elderly, who wish to settle the costs of their funeral themselves. In February '97, Age Concern Enterprises have launched their own-brand funeral plans, provided by the American SCI corporation which now controls 15 per cent of the UK funerals business.
Potential purchasers might think it reasonable to assume that the Age Concern brand must be the best value available, thus removing the need to 'shop around' for this most sensitive of services, but they would be wrong. The Age Concern plan is poor value on three counts: price, the treatment of 'disbursements' and the choice of funeral director to provide the service.
In contrast to the Age Concern plan, Funeral Planning Services administers over 100 plans offered by local funeral directors across the country, the funds for which are kept in Funeral Planning Trust until required. The price of a funeral varies from one area to another but the average price of their basic funeral plan is £985 - which is £68 (7 per cent) less than Age Concern's basic funeral plan; and a standard plan (which is what most people buy) is £1,270 - nearly £200 (18 per cent) less than Age Concern's; top price plans offered by independent funeral directors are, at £1,573, only slightly cheaper than Age Concern's (£1,625), but the specification of the funeral plan is likely to be more generous.
Around a quarter of the cost of a funeral is made up of 'disbursements' paid by the funeral director to other parties, such as the crematorium or cemetery fee, doctors' fees for a cremation certificate and the minister's fee. Disbursement costs vary from one area to another, so a locally-priced plan is more relevant. The Age Concern plan includes £300 towards these fees whereas independent funeral directors include an average of £330, and some even guarantee that the main costs will be covered.
By purchasing a funeral pre-payment plan, as distinct from a conventional insurance policy, customers are entering into a contract with the funeral director. With plans offered by funeral directors themselves, it is obvious who is going to be entrusted with the funeral, and people will often have a view about the firm (good or bad) based on previous experience or local reputation. With the Age Concern plan the funeral director will normally be the nearest branch of the SCI corporation through its other English subsidiary, Family Funeral Directors Limited - the name and location not usually being disclosed until after the plan is paid for.
Despite the Age Concern branding, only 25 per cent of the company established to promote the Age Concern Funeral Plan is owned by the Age Concern charity, through its trading subsidiary Age Concern Enterprises Limited. The majority is owned by the Texas-based SCI corporation through its English subsidiary Funeral Plans Limited. SCI have recently been accused of inflating the cost of British funerals, and the Labour shadow consumer affairs minister has said that SCI would be the first company he would refer to the Monopolies and Mergers Commission, (Sunday Telegraph 26th January '97).
Graham Williams, Funeral Planning Services, Freepost IH4150, Flint House, Ipswich Road, Long Stratton, Norwich NR15 2TA (tel 01508 532 632; fax 01508 531 988).
Summarised from a six page open letter (Feb 1st '97) to Sally Greengross OBE, director general of Age Concern, calling for her resignation over the then links between Age Concern and the SCI Chosen Heritage Plan.
I am aware that most charities engage in trading activities, but not ones that are at variance with their charitable activities. I buy fair-trade tea and coffee in the local Oxfam shop if I cannot get it in Tesco. However Oxfam use their trading activities to further their work as well as raising money. Their tea and coffee comes (I trust) from plantations where the workers are paid and treated reasonably. It would be extraordinary to find Oxfam selling tea grown on estates where workers were paid below-subsistence wages, or the Cancer Research Campaign promoting the sale of cigarettes on the grounds that it benefited the charity.
I do not know of any other charity that enters into promotional deals with a company whose policies are directed at exploiting those whom the charity exists for. A while ago it was reported that MIND will not accept sponsorship or donations from drug companies, so that if a question regarding drugs and mental illness comes up it will not only be able to express a disinterested opinion but will be seen to do so.
When it comes to funerals and the funeral industry, Age Concern should be amongst the first to speak up when necessary; the Economist (Jan 4th '97) points out that whilst SCI gets the lion's share of bad publicity, the rest of the industry is not without fault. Age Concern cannot critically examine SCI's way of doing business (and woe betide any member of staff who does so); and because it is in SCI's pocket cannot sensibly comment on the rest of the industry.
SCI represents a threat to independent undertakers, many of whom provide a high quality service at a reasonable price. Within each local area Age Concern should be working to identify and support such firms.
A. C. Bryer, 5A Waldegrave Gardens, Twickenham, Middlesex TW1 4PQ.
The following adapted extract from The Natural Death Handbook recommends woodland burial as possibly the cheapest advance funeral option.
The greenest best buy for those needing to arrange the funeral in advance might be to set aside sufficient funds in a joint savings account (held jointly with your partner or your executors) to cover the full costs of one of the less expensive Woodland Burial grounds which have established arrangements for providing a coffin and for collecting the body. These include: Hinton Park in Dorset (tel 01255 503456), Greenhaven near Rugby (tel 01788 860604) and Oakfield in Essex (tel 01255 880182). But be very cautious about handing over money in advance. It is one thing to buy burial rights, and quite another to hand over money years in advance for digging graves and body collection. It might also be worth approaching the charitable A. B. Welfare and Wildlife Trust in North Yorkshire (tel 01423 530900) to see if a special prearrangement can be made for one of their sites.
Hinton Park, for instance, charge £650 in advance for a coffin and a plot, including the digging and filling of the grave, the planting of a tree, the provision of a small memorial plaque and the collection of the body (in a green Renault Espace). Extra is charged if the body is collected from beyond a 50 mile radius (collection from London costs about £100 extra).
Thus for a London family looking for a site within range of the city, the three feasible sites are Hinton Park, Greenhaven or Oakfield, and the total funeral charges, including collecting the body from London, would be £750 for Hinton Park; £750 for Oakfield; and £399 for Greenhaven (£429 if a driver's assistant is also needed).
You will not be able to match such prices with any of the more normal pre-paid funeral plans.The Natural Death Handbook is available for £14-99 incl. p&p from the Natural Death Centre, 6 Blackstock Mews, Blackstock Road, London N4 2BT (tel 0871 288 2098; fax 020 7354 3831; e-mail: rhino@dial.pipex.com). Or you can place a secure online order.
This webpage forms part of the Global Ideas Bank (www.globalideasbank.org).
Book Orders: To order any of the other Natural Death Centre or Global Ideas Bank books.
To make a comment or to send an update, please e-mail the Global Ideas
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