Author: Fran Hall

How much does cremation cost in 2022?

15 August 2022
Fran Hall
3 Comments
Categories: cremation, crematoria, funeral cost

With well over 3/4 of British funerals now culminating in cremation, and with the relentless promotion of direct cremation on mainstream TV channels, we thought it was about time to look at the cost of being cremated in 2022. 

The Competition and Markets Authority’s Funeral Market Investigation Order 2021 mandated that all crematoria must publish their prices, which has made this research possible (even if not easy!) – we are extremely grateful for this new transparency.

Some important provisos  before we start – for the purpose of this blog post, and to avoid completely drowning in numbers, we are only focusing on the cremation fees here, not the full price for a funeral. Once funeral director fees are added on, the total costs will, of course, be significantly higher. 

We have looked at the price charged for a standard adult cremation, with a ceremony at 11.00am or thereabouts, where varying prices are shown for different times of the day. 

We aren’t comparing the multiple different prices for direct cremations, or ‘attended direct cremations’, we’re simply looking at the standard cremation fees published by the crematoria companies.

There are lots of numbers and links, but we’ll try to make it easy to follow – we’ll break it up with some gorgeous photos by Rachel Wallace taken at the wonderful Mortlake Crematorium, run by a collective of four London Boroughs (and where cremation fees are among the lowest 10% in the country!) 

The first and most obvious finding is that there is an absolutely enormous disparity across the country. You could almost describe it as a postcode lottery. 

The tremendously useful league table from The Cremation Society of Great Britain (CMS) shows an astonishing range of fees; the 2021 fee for a single standard adult cremation ranged from £392 to £1,100,  a difference of £708. 

Citizens of Belfast have access to the lowest cremation fees in the United Kingdom, with the local authority run City of Belfast Crematorium currently charging residents of the city a very reasonable £408. But back across the Irish Sea, for those of us in the rest of the UK, things are very different.

The CMS league table tells us that there were 312 crematoria operating in 2021, and of these, (excluding Belfast), 90% of them charged more than £700, while the latest cremation statistics from the same source show that the average total cremation charge in the UK in January 2022 was £867.75.

The crematorium with the highest standard fee is the independently owned Parkgrove Crematorium in Angus, Scotland, where the fee for an adult cremation is £1,100.

Head south to Oxfordshire and a ceremony at a ‘premium time’ (12.00, 13.00 or 14.00) will cost you even more – £1,140 for a lunch time ceremony at either of the two Memoria run crematoria – North Oxfordshire Crematorium and South Oxfordshire Crematorium. 

Now, it’s an interesting thing that there are three crematoria serving Oxford and the surrounding area – all privately owned, the above two owned by Memoria, and a third, Oxford Crematorium, owned and run by Dignity PLC (now rebranded as The Crematorium and Memorial Group). A 60 minute ‘slot’ at any of these three crematoria will cost a minimum of £1,070 (at the Dignity crematorium), while the two Memoria crematoria both charge £1,090 for an 11am booking.

Down in the seaside town of Brighton, however, there are two crematoria, one local authority run, the other privately owned. Woodvale Crematorium is run by Brighton & Hove City Council, and charges £715 for a cremation, while half a mile away, Dignity operate The Downs Crematorium and somehow manages to undercut the local authority with a cremation fee of £678. A whopping discount of £392 compared with the Dignity price of £1,070 for a cremation in Oxford – or at nine of their other crematoria across the country.

Prices at the remaining Dignity crematoria (there are 46 in total) range between £675 at Stockport Crematorium (that’s a one-off, the lowest price charged by any crematorium in the group, and perhaps reflective of the fact that there are 13 other crematoria serving the Greater Manchester area) to £1,060, which curiously is the fee charged by both of the Dignity owned crematoria which serve the people of Norwich, Earlham Crematorium and St. Faiths Crematorium. 

No other crematoria are located in the city, so to find a lower cost cremation fee in the Norwich area you’d need to travel half an hour west to the privately owned Breckland Crematorium (£895), head 23 miles north to Cromer Crematorium, operated by the Westerleigh Group (£1,040), take a 50 mile round trip to the local authority run Great Yarmouth Crematorium (£895) or drive a similar distance to the Memoria crematorium Waveney Memorial Park (£945). 

Dignity aren’t the only company that appear to be sensitive to the pricing of nearby crematoria – over in Retford, in Nottinghamshire, a 11.00am cremation at Memoria’s Barnby Moor Crematorium is priced at £775,while the Westerleigh owned Babworth Crematorium, two and a half miles away, charges £825. 

These are among the lowest prices charged by either operator; all of Memoria’s other crematoria charge between £930 – £1,090, while Westerleigh has one crematorium charging less (Aylesbury Vale Crematorium at £699) and 35 other crematoria charging between £850 – £1,115. (The Westerleigh crematorium at Aylesbury Vale is just three miles from Bierton Crematorium which is operated by three local councils and charges a cremation fee of £700.)

It is clear that a large part of the cremation fee charged by crematoria is the hire fee for the ceremony space, as there are significantly discounted fees for early morning and unattended cremations – most crematoria charge between £350 – £500 for a direct cremation, but as the majority of people still choose to hold a ceremony, the disparity across the country in prices of the cremation fees that families are required to pay is shocking.

Setting aside the coincidence of (extraordinarily) similar fees to close competitors or sister crematoria in some locations, the range of prices charged by the same operators in different areas and the very significant difference between the lowest and highest fees around the country, the situation of crematorium fees is more concerning in the light of initiatives from two of the cremation companies:

Pure Cremation Ltd (they of the cutesy daytime TV adverts) operate Charlton Park Crematorium, which is where the cremations arranged under their nationwide direct cremation service are carried out. 

The crematorium can also be used by families not employing Pure Cremation, and prices range from £450 for a direct cremation to £900 for an hour in the ceremony room. 

So far, so par for the course. Until you see the advertisements placed by Pure Cremation in the trade magazines for the funeral sector.

What the company is offering to funeral directors that partner with them is a preferential cremation fee  – £250 where the funeral director delivers the coffin to Charlswood Park, and collects the cremated remains by appointment,  £350 where the Pure Cremation team collect the coffin from the funeral home and return the cremated remains by hand.

The copy on their website page for partners states ‘Some people only want the simplest direct cremation at the lowest possible cost but would prefer to be looked after by a local firm. Our low cremation fees mean that you can say “Yes” to serving these families at a price that they feel good about… yet still achieves a healthy margin for you.’

This sounds excellent from a client’s point of view; a local funeral director service, an efficient direct cremation and the cremated remains returned to them. All at the lowest possible price (assuming that the saving on the cremation fee is passed on by the funeral company concerned, of course).

It also makes it clear that the actual cost of cremating an adult is less than £250.

Otherwise, Pure Cremations wouldn’t be offering this service at this price.

Memoria appear to have been similarly struck by inspiration at the idea of partnering with funeral directors, although they have a slightly different take on it. They are also offering discounted cremation fees to select funeral directors – £300 in this case for direct cremations, £400 for small, attended funeral ceremonies before 11.00am.

A letter from former owner and current Group CEO, Howard Hodgson, landed on the doormats of funeral directors recently, notifying them of an upcoming Memoria TV advertising campaign promoting ‘affordable, local and attended cremation funeral services as an alternative to direct cremation’, and inviting them to become a Memoria Brand Partner.

According to the FAQ’s on the website, a Memoria Brand Partner is ‘a funeral director who works exclusively with Memoria to offer the attended local funeral service – the Personal Funeral Service – to bereaved families as an alternative to Direct Cremation. Memoria is also to be their exclusive provider of their direct cremations.’

Brand Partners will benefit from ‘preferential cremation fees for both Direct Cremation (£300) and the Personal Funeral Service (£400)’ as well as branded marketing material and the backing of Memoria TV and digital advertising at no cost to their business.

Somewhat less appealing to most funeral directors, perhaps, is the fact that Memoria will, as part of the contractual arrangement required in exchange for the preferential cremation fees, set the total price of the Direct Cremation and Personal Funeral Service – £990 and £1,395 respectively. 

It seems to us that this initiative by Memoria is not just an attempt to push back at the rise of direct cremation by promoting low cost, attended funerals, but it is also an attempt to enlist sufficient funeral directors to carry out the logistics of the ‘arranging’ elements of a funeral by enticing them to sign up as exclusive partners with discounted cremation fees. (Something similar was attempted by Memoria’s sister company, Low Cost Funerals, now rebranded as Affordable Funerals and listed at Companies House with the same directors as Memoria. Affordable Funerals already offer Direct Cremations and Personal Funeral Services at the same prices as those that we’ll see advertised by Memoria and their partners over the coming months).

The prices charged to non-affiliated funeral directors for direct cremations are listed as £450 at each of the Memoria crematoria, 50% higher than the £300 fee that Brand Partners will be charged for each cremation. 

For small funeral directors, this is a significant amount to offset as part of their total package price. It could render it impossible for non-affiliated funeral directors to compete in price against companies who sign up as a Memoria Brand Partner – the former would have to provide all the services involved in organising a cremation for £540 after paying the £450 cremation fee, while the Brand Partner would have £690 left to cover the costs of overheads, staff, vehicles, coffin supply, insurance and so forth. 

Effectively, Memoria’s initiative could make it impossible for small funeral businesses to offer direct cremations at a competitive rate in areas where there are no other crematoria available and where other funeral directors are partnering with Memoria and receiving discounted cremation fees. If this happens, then the ultimate loser will be the bereaved people whose choices will have been diminished.

So, what have we learned from this long (and possibly quite boring) deep dive into cremation fees? Mainly the following:

  • That private companies are doing what they are supposed to do, i.e., making money.
  • That an individual cremation can be carried out for under £250, with the company providing the service still making money from it.
  • And that bereaved families are being charged an extraordinarily huge amount of money for the room hire for their funeral ceremonies. More than £800 an hour in some cases!

Armed with this knowledge, what can the public do?

We recommend – as always – asking a lot of questions before committing yourself to making funeral arrangements with any company. Think about what matters to you, make a list of things that you want to know, then call funeral directors and ask them. 

If you are planning to have a funeral ceremony prior to cremation, you could explore the possibility of hiring a venue for the ceremony then arranging for the cremation to take place separately, perhaps early the following day at a reduced rate. 

You may find that you can hire a village hall for the whole day for a ceremony and a reception for less than the cost of a 40-minute ceremony in a crematorium chapel. Or your local pub might be willing to let you book it for the day and have a ceremony in the garden. Maybe you or a relative have space to hold a ceremony at home? You do not need to be confined to holding a ceremony at a crematorium. Once you begin to think of alternative places and spaces, all kinds of possibilities may occur to you.

You could enquire about other crematoria rather than the one closest to you – do a Google search for ‘crematorium in *your area’. Look at the crematoria websites, they all list prices for both funeral services and for direct cremations, and many will show different fees for different times of the day. Often, local authority owned and run crematoria will charge less than the privately owned ones, although not always.

All funeral directors are required to list the fees of their local crematoria on their Standardised Price List which must be shown on their website, so you may be able to get an idea of costs in your area by checking these, but then double check with the crematorium itself in case fees have changed recently.

You may be considering a direct cremation? If so, be particularly wary of companies advertising themselves as direct cremation providers online. 

We will be writing about this subject in detail in a dedicated blog post in the coming weeks, but for now we can summarise by recommending you always approach a company with a physical presence, a proper funeral director rather than an internet-based provider. Ask them exactly where the cremation will take place, and when. Ask for a breakdown of their advertised ‘direct cremation’ fee. Ask them if they and their staff will take the coffin to the crematorium, or if this part of their service is subcontracted. Ask them if any part of their service is subcontracted, and if so, to whom.

Remember, you are the client. You are paying for a service, and you have every right to know what you are paying for.

What to wear to a funeral

9 August 2022
Fran Hall
No comments
Categories: Etiquette, Funeral advice, Funerals, The future of funerals

Recent photographs of the former President Trump and his family solemnly lining the steps of the Church of St. Vincent Ferrer in New York City, watching Ivana Trump’s $125,000 ‘golden hued casket’ as it was carried to the waiting hearse offer us absolute visual confirmation of what the Western world deems to be appropriate ‘attire’ at a funeral. 

It’s not clear whether the wall-to-wall sea of black and navy suits looked quite so appropriate as Ivana’s casket was lowered into the solitary grave by the first tee at Trump’s Bedminster Golf Club, apparently endowing Trump with a ‘huge tax break’ by effectively turning the golf club into a cemetery in the process. 

Anyway. We were recently struck by the advice offered by the big players in the UK funeral sector telling people what they should wear to a funeral. On their websites. With what appears to be all due solemnity. As if there’s a public service being offered by guiding people towards an important social imperative of funeral etiquette. 

Firstly, we wondered exactly who would be looking to the likes of Dignity Funerals, Co-operative Funeralcare and Funeral Partners for guidance?

Check with the family of the person who has died, by all means. If the family want a particular dress code or theme to a funeral, then you can be sure that this will be communicated to guests. If in doubt, ask a family member, or the celebrant, or the funeral arranger involved. It is, we would suggest, unlikely that many people would log on to a corporate funeral director’s website for advice.

There can’t be many adults in the country who aren’t able to decide for themselves what to wear to any given event, and goodness knows there are enough examples of funerals on TV, on the news, in films – and just in general life – to indicate what people at funerals usually wear. For the big players to bestow their learned advice on the public seems both paternalistic and patronising, and, we would suggest, not a little self-interested. 

There is a vested interest for the largest funeral companies to ensure that in 2022, funerals continue to look the same as they did in 1922; the big black shiny cars, the outdated Victorian garb of the funeral director complete with hat and waistcoat identifiable as the master of ceremonies, the sombre men in black jackets and grey striped trousers silently shouldering a coffin bedecked with a ‘floral tribute’ – and assembled ranks of mourners in black clothing completing this picture of how a funeral ‘should’ look.

For some families, a traditional look to a funeral is absolutely what they want, and we are not in any way criticising this. There are all sorts of reasons for preference at a funeral, we just don’t think that funeral directors’ guides to etiquette should be arbiters of taste. That’s the role for the family involved.

For other families, all that is needed is an awareness that there is no right or wrong – freed from the expectations of others, many people might choose a very different look to the funeral ceremony they are organising. A good funeral director will support and encourage this, but unfortunately, many families who have engaged a funeral company that is part of a large chain might not experience a similar freedom.

The big players in the funeral industry aren’t interested in creativity or self-expression at a funeral. A funeral conductor with a colourful pocket handkerchief or bearers in different colour ties or the offer of an ‘alternative hearse’ – this is about the extent of what the large corporates can offer clients, while everything else slots in to ‘service as usual’.

Guests might be invited to wear something colourful if the person who died had a favourite colour, but for the vast, vast majority of funerals there appears to still be an expectation that mourners will arrive wearing traditional ‘respectful’ formal black clothes. And while this might be a cultural norm for some, and very much expected in some communities, in an increasingly secular society, changes are happening.

Secondly, the advice from the big players in funeralworld reads as if they have all tried to edit and individualise a single original archaic document. 

Dignity Funerals sternly admonish: 

“Do not wear any of the following to a funeral:

  • Revealing or suggestive clothing
  • Trainers or flip flops
  • Printed t-shirts
  • Jeans
  • Caps
  • Colourful ties
  • Excessive amounts of jewellery”

Co-operative Funeralcare are a little more generous but have similar warnings:

“If the family have requested bright colours or a particular theme, then of course this is fine, but in most cases it’s best to avoid:

  • Jeans
  • Short sleeved shirts
  • Revealing clothing
  • Flip flops or trainers
  • Football shirts/sportswear
  • Caps
  • T shirts
  • Clothing with logos or branding
  • Flashy jewellery”

Funeral Partners are more subtle, including detailed advice for women, men, children and toddlers (!) in a heavily loaded piece with lots of emphasis on ‘smart’ and recommendations to avoid ‘jeans, revealing clothing, flashy jewellery and hats’ (for women), and ‘jeans, short-sleeved shirts, trainers and caps/beanies’ for men.

It seems that the three main funeral providers in the UK are united in their approach to ensuring that gatherings of mourners at funerals are all dressed ‘appropriately’ by issuing their opinions so strongly:

Don’t, whatever you do, wear jeans to a funeral. Or a cap. Or the peculiarly judged ‘flashy jewellery’. Presumably, according to this guidance, if you were foolish or rebellious enough to do so, something terrible would happen. Everyone would know you were deliberately showing ‘disrespect’ to the person who has died, or their family. You would upset someone. You’d be shown up for the social outcast you obviously are. Didn’t you read the guide to funeral etiquette on the funeral director’s helpful website? Don’t you understand what is APPROPRIATE??? 

The funeral companies sprinkle references to what is ‘appropriate’ throughout their ‘what to wear’ guides, ladling on a heavy sense of obligation to get it right. We would respectfully ask, who gets to decide what is appropriate or not? Ever? Definitely not the people dressed up like Goth tribute acts with top hats, fob watches and canes, or their colleagues who sit in their ‘funeral homes’ ‘attired’ like bank clerks under the company uniform code enforced by their managers.

We view these guides with a similar level of weariness as we have for the stock photos of funerals regularly used to illustrate press articles – they’re just out of date and irrelevant. And unnecessary. They serve only to shore up the funeral directors’ over inflated sense of their own importance, setting themselves as the advice-bestowing arbiters of taste. 

They reflect funerals as they were, not how they are. They don’t reflect the changing face of funerals, the diversity of our society, the emergence of awareness that funerals are whatever people want them to be. The begrudging references to ‘it’s best to check the wishes of the bereaved family’ heavily imply that anything other than following the etiquette outlined is an aberration, an exception to the traditional rules, which are so much more comfortable and preferable, so much more ‘appropriate’. 

And infuriatingly, as well as being outdated, these guides are poorly written and pompous in tone – see some examples below: 

“If you are unsure of what to wear, it’s important to be respectful to the deceased.”  (what does this even mean??)

“By wearing casual clothes, you could be unintentionally sending the message that you don’t care about the person who has died” 

“Black clothing isn’t always compulsory for women but it is best to wear a dark coloured skirt, dress or pair of trousers”.

The Funeral Partners website is the only one of the three to acknowledge that some cultures differ in what people are expected to wear to a funeral, noting that wearing black is not considered appropriate (there’s that word again) at a Hindu funeral or a Sikh funeral. 

Whoever wrote this particular piece then goes on to helpfully describe ‘some other popular colours worn worldwide’, telling us that ‘in South Africa, red is sometimes worn as a colour of mourning’, that in Thailand ‘purple represents sorrow and is often worn by widows during the mourning period’ and, perhaps the most irrelevant inclusion, ‘in Papua New Guinea a widow applies a stone-coloured clay to their skin while mourning their husband.’  All very interesting, but of absolutely no help to a reader wondering whether they are ok to wear their navy suit to go to their neighbour’s funeral in Clacton. It’s almost as if someone got overexcited and embellished their boring ‘wear black to a funeral’ article with some gems from Wikipedia. 

We think that it’s ridiculous, in this day and age, to be telling people what ‘etiquette’ dictates that they should be wearing to any event. ‘Etiquette’ is defined as ‘the social set of rules that control accepted behaviour in particular social groups or social situations’ – an invisible ‘code of conduct’ that serves to ensure people feel either part of a group or an excluded other who doesn’t conform. 

Etiquette is associated with the constructs of the British social class system, the status hierarchy of the ‘genteel’ upper classes and the ‘coarse’ lower classes, reflecting and encapsulating the conventional norms of the former. In the mid 18th century, the adoption of etiquette was a self-conscious process for acquiring the conventions of politeness and the normative behaviours (charm, manners, demeanour) which symbolically identified the person as a genteel member of the upper class.

In order to identify with the social élite, the upwardly mobile middle class and the bourgeoisie adopted the behaviours and the artistic preferences of the upper class. To that end, socially ambitious people of the middle classes occupied themselves with learning, knowing, and practising the rules of social etiquette, adopting mannerisms, vocabulary – and dress. This is where the roots of the bizarre ‘Guides to Funeral Etiquette’ originate from.

We would suggest that, almost 300 years on, as British society undergoes enormous change and adaptation, embracing diversity and difference, as the control of the church diminishes and the deference to the social constructs of the upper class fades away, there is no place for out-dated aping of the manners and foibles of the richest in society. 

Funerals of the rich and famous follow a set pattern, based on historic traditions and expected patterns, and these serve to reinforce the unspoken class system we all live amidst. Harking back to Victorian foppery in the spectacle of the public display of mourning serves nobody well. Apart from the companies who have invested millions of pounds in providing the foppery props, of course. 

Wear what you like to a funeral. It’s your presence that matters, not whether you are wearing jeans and flipflops and your flashiest jewellery rather than deepest black crepe and a veil. The person who has died won’t care. And if you meant something to that person, then their family won’t care either. They’ll just be glad to have you there. 

Also, you might have a small sense of satisfaction at not being dressed like a member of the Trump family. 

Funeral plans – a bonfire of vanities

4 August 2022
Fran Hall
1 Comment
Categories: funeral plans

If you or a member of your family have taken out a pre-paid funeral plan, read on. Important information below!

 

On Friday last week, the crowded funeral plan landscape suddenly became a little less bustling. Quite a lot less, actually.

 

On 29th July 2022, the  Financial Conduct Authority took on the regulation of the funeral plan market, and with immediate effect, almost two thirds of funeral plan providers have been refused permission to sell new plans, leaving just 26 funeral plan providers that will be authorised by the FCA.

 

There were, until 29th July, around 70 companies selling funeral plans in the UK. Some large, with enormous amounts of money invested, some small. All were required to apply to the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) for authorisation after the government legislated in January 2021 to bring pre-paid funeral plans into FCA regulation.

 

The market had been, until last week, completely unregulated, and over the years there have been various high-profile collapses of funeral plan providers, leaving customers who thought that their funerals were organised and paid for in the distressing position of finding out their money had been lost, and that there was absolutely no redress. 

The most recent company to go into liquidation is Unique Funeral Plans, which announced on 22nd July that its 3,000 customers would not receive refunds, nor would their funeral plans be transferred to alternative providers. The previous week, on 14th July, Not for Profit Funeral Plans Ltd was placed into liquidation with all funeral plans terminated with immediate effect.

This came just weeks after approximately 45,000 people who had purchased a funeral plan from Safe Hands Funeral Plans were told they could expect to receive back just 10% of the plan value by administrators, after that company collapsed into administration in March. 

Temporarily, Dignity Funerals Ltd has agreed to fulfil all funerals of Safe Hands funeral plan holders for six months from 11th May 2022, and they are contacting all plan holders offering (for additional contributions) a replacement funeral plan from Dignity, see details here.

Curiously, at the same time, Dignity have paused their sale of funeral plans, quite a decision for a company that usually sells around 1,000 plans a week!!

Anyway, we digress. 

13 further plan providers that applied for FCA authorisation have not been authorised. These companies are permitted to continue administering existing funeral plans until 31st October, but they are prohibited from selling any new plans. By 31st October, they must transfer their plans to authorised firms or refund their customers. They are permitted to continue receiving instalment payments, if you already have a plan with them, and they should be contacting you to let you know what’s happening. Make sure you respond to any communication you receive where required. 

Plans offered by these 13 companies are not covered by FCA regulation, meaning there is no protection by the Financial Ombudsman Service (FOS) and the Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS) until they are transferred to authorised providers.

You can see the full FCA list here, showing the 26 companies that the FCA is authorising, the 13 companies that are permitted to continue administering plans and a non-exhaustive list of 10 companies that must not sell or administer plans. 

It is estimated that there are almost two million people in the UK who have taken out a funeral plan to cover the costs of their funeral, and 87% of this market (around 1.6 million plans) are provided by the 26 providers now authorised by the FCA, meaning that customers will now have access to the Financial Services Compensation Scheme, so their money is protected if their provider fails. 

Planholders with authorised companies can also make a complaint to the Financial Ombudsman Service even if the issue they are complaining about happened before July 2022 if the firm was registered with the Funeral Planning Authority (FPA) at the time the issue occurred.

The FCA will monitor adherence to the new regulations that have come into force, which include:

  • A ban on cold calling.
  • A ban on commission payments to intermediaries, such as funeral directors.
  • A requirement for a funeral plan to deliver a funeral unless the customer dies within two years of taking out the plan, in which case a full refund will be offered.

Finally, it seems, purchasers of pre-paid funeral plans can have confidence that their chosen provider is both reputable and reliable, and that their money will be safe.

Here at the GFG we have a pretty jaded view of the entire principle of encouraging people to decide and pay for their funerals in advance, and we’ve written extensively about our misgivings. 

We have argued that advance payment ‘for peace of mind’, as it’s advertised, is actually entering into an expensive transaction that often leaves bereaved families without choice or control of an event that is supposed to be for them, not for the person who has died. Read this blog post from 2019 which shows just how unsatisfactory – and financially unbeneficial – a funeral plan can be.

We understand that many people worry about the costs of funerals, and that, for some, paying for their funeral arrangements in advance is an attractive prospect, particularly with the escalation in funeral costs that continue relentlessly year on year. Securing funeral services at today’s price seems both sensible and responsible, particularly for the prudent generation reaching their 80’s and 90’s, something that has not gone unnoticed by the marketing teams of funeral planning companies.

Until now, people purchasing pre-paid funeral plans have had to hope that their chosen plan provider was a secure and responsible entity, and that the ‘stress and worry of planning a funeral’ was all taken care of with the stroke of a pen on their cheque as they sent the forms back in the pre-paid envelope helpfully provided. There was, though, no guarantee of this.

Finally, with the oversight of the FCA now in place, people who want to settle their funeral arrangements in advance will be able to have confidence that their money is safe and that their decisions about their funeral will be carried out as they wish. 

This FCA safety net has been needed for a very long time, and we are relieved that it is now in place.

St. Margaret’s Hospice Funerals. It’s over.

27 July 2022
Fran Hall
1 Comment
Categories: Hospice Funerals

It gives us no pleasure at all to report that the ill-fated venture embarked on by the CEO of St. Margaret’s Hospice in Somerset back in 2017 has come to an end. A statement on the website was posted today, and today’s edition of the Somerset County Gazette confirmed an email that we received this morning telling us that the funeral business had closed.

Back in November 2017, when we first heard about the plans for a well loved and respected hospice to go into partnership with a company operating crematoria around the UK and offer a franchise scheme for other hospices to do the same, we sounded the alarm in a post on this blog.

We followed this up the next month with a letter that we sent to the board of trustees of every single hospice in the UK advising them against following St. Margaret’s Hospice into what we considered to be a foolish and costly venture – we published the letter here. We were supported by many funeral directors from across the country who shared our concerns and added their names to the letter.

Further posts on the GFG blog on the same topic from December 2017 can be seen here, here and here. We were taking it very seriously indeed, as you can see. The use of funds donated to a hospice to set up a funeral directing business seemed to us to be foolhardy in the extreme, and the franchise idea was a folly that we hoped no other hospice would be tempted to embark on.

Undaunted, St. Margaret’s Hospice went ahead with their plans, and on 22nd January 2018 they opened the doors of their first branch in Taunton – we wrote about it here and shared the results of our survey , evidencing that the vast majority of donors to a hospice would not be happy for their donations to be used to set up and run a funeral franchise. These findings were referenced in a BBC Points West programme that covered the controversial closure of St. Margaret’s in-patient hospice ward in Yeovil.

In August 2019, we wrote another post with updates about the venture, including the disappearance of Low Cost Funerals as a partner with the hospice. St. Margaret’s were going it alone.

Then it all went quiet. Other things took priority as the whole world was affected by the pandemic. The success or failure of the hospice funeral venture in Somerset was not on our radar until today’s email arrived.

Looking back, and reading back through our public expressions of concern, it is still astonishing to consider the naivety – or foolishness – of the trustees who supported the idea of a hospice investing funds into offering funerals to its patients and the wider community, in a town where there were plenty of funeral directors already. It is difficult to understand the business case that persuaded them. And it is difficult to understand why the many, many warnings were not heeded.

The hospice apparently assured anyone who questioned them about the ethics of offering patients a funeral provided by their trading subsidiary that they wouldn’t be ‘pushing’ the funeral service at patients and families’, so it couldn’t be that patients would be encouraged to choose the hospice funeral service. It must have simply been confidence in the idea that local people would be attracted by the idea of supporting the hospice through electing to use the funeral service they operated. A risky basis for investing such a considerable amount of donated funds, as we pointed out at the time.

(Reading Ms Lee’s comments to the Somerset County Gazette today, one could be forgiven for wondering quite what she means by this statement ‘Mrs Lee added: “More recently, a change in regulations has also limited how we talk to patients and their families, and because this venture has not realised a financial return for the charity, it is now necessary to close our funeral business”. How exactly were patients being talked to about the funeral business?

St. Margaret’s Hospice most recent trustee report (dated November 2021) states that the decision was taken to “impair the intercompany balance that the funeral business owes to the Hospice. At this moment in time the Board cannot say with certainty that this balance will be recovered, there are too many unknowns in the future projections for the funeral business. The Trustees have therefore recognised a £508,000 impairment provision in the accounts to reflect this uncertainty”.

The report goes on to state; “We are proud of the decision we took to enter the funeral marketplace and saw this as a strategic and natural extension of the services that the hospice provides, as well as an opportunity to diversify and generate a new and sustainable income stream for the charity. Our aim was to disrupt the marketplace, challenge funeral poverty by encouraging more transparent and fair pricing, and provide our community with alternative options, which we have achieved. The financial return has not yet been achieved, but a new pricing and marketing strategy is being implemented with the aim to do just that.”

And yet, here we are. 

Exactly where we and so many others predicted we would be. Hundreds of thousands of pounds spent, a charity shop specializing in baby and children’s items closed to convert into a funeral home, irreparable damage done to the reputation of a much -loved hospice and, presumably, several local people losing their jobs.

It’s hard to find out how much money from legacies and fund raising has been wasted on this foolhardy venture, Companies House shows the most recent accounts for St. Margaret’s Funerals Ltd. (Company No 10985626) as at 31st March 2021 with a deficit of £427,946. The accounts for Hospice Funerals LLP(Company No OC419616) as at 31st March 2021 show a deficit of £328,348, while there are no current accounts for Hospice Funerals Trading Ltd (Company No10953084), the second company in the LLP with St. Margaret’s Hospice Funerals. 

Interested parties – of which there are likely to be many – will have to wait until the trustees’ report from St. Margaret’s Hospice reveals the extent of the losses.

In the meantime, we are very sorry that we were right. 

If only someone had listened.

500 days

2 March 2022
Fran Hall
1 Comment
Categories: Absolute Beginner - A Personal Story of Grief, bereavement, Grief

 

Oh my love. 

 

500 days have passed. 500 days without you in my world. 

 

How have I got through these days? I remember as clear as if it were yesterday the moment that you died, the sudden knowledge that everything – everything had changed. Everything about that moment is vivid in my mind, although the hours leading inexorably towards it are blurred and confused in my memory. But the instant of your death is seared in my heart forever. It was as if all the air was sucked from the room. At that instant, all of our life together came to an abrupt end, and the unknown rest of my days alone began. 

 

It’s inconceivable to me that so many days have come and gone since that moment. I have no idea how I managed to get to today. In the beginning, in the madness of those early crazed days of shock and fear and dread, I couldn’t imagine getting to this milestone. 

 

It was all I could do to get through each day, sometimes each hour. Every minute was endless, heavy with the weight of the unknown, the rawness of love turned to grief. I had to get used to it, to learn how to be. Who to be.

 

I didn’t recognise myself – I still don’t much of the time, but in those early days I was completely undone, like a shattered kaleidoscope. Picking up the pieces, such a literal expression of the work of grieving, you have to find the broken pieces of the person you used to be and try to reassemble them into something that feels a bit like the you that was. 

 

It’s so bloody hard. There are still days when I just can’t, when I function on autopilot, just getting through another day. This was every day, to begin with, but gradually, as the world turned and the seasons changed and time went by, these worst of days are fewer and fewer. I had to find my own remedies, to learn to trust that the awfulness would pass and to just endure.

 

I thought often of Jon Underwood in those early days, hearing his lovely gentle voice reminding me of the impermanence of everything, and of course he was right. Nothing stays the same, everything changes, the darkness is always followed by the light. Steve’s voice echoes in my mind too – “keep going, keep going”. 

 

And I did. I am. One day after another. One night after another. Getting days behind me since the day everything changed.

 

So here I am. 500 days done. Who knows how many ahead. Maybe not many, if the insanity in Ukraine explodes into a world war, or if a new variant of the virus that took Steve’s life emerges. Maybe thousands, if by some miracle I live another 20 years or more. Nobody knows. I understand this now, the uncertainty, the impermanence. Life is so very fragile, what we believe to be given is never guaranteed. Across the world, everyone learns this at some point in their lives, some brutally, with shocking surprise, some with resignation and acceptance. 

 

I have learned so much in these last 500 days. I am a different person now. I don’t know if this is a common thing, or whether it’s magnified by the experience of losing Steve to the pandemic that has changed all our lives. I think it’s probably the latter. This lived experience of trauma is shared by many others I have met and spoken to, it’s borne out by research and is the ongoing subject of many academic studies.

 

Grieving during a pandemic is not to be recommended, that’s for sure. The complexities and compounding factors are myriad, and far beyond my ability to articulate (not least because of the lingering impact of Long Covid which continues to affect my retrieval of words, along with a number of other unwelcome after-effects).

 

All I can do is try and capture where I am now, to time stamp the journey of my grief.

 

Apart from the presence of my beloved grandchildren, the concern of my daughters and the kindness and support of a few lovely friends, the gruelling endurance of the last 16 and a half months has only been made bearable by finding others who share this pain.

 

For me, this came in the shape of Covid-19 Bereaved Families for Justice, a campaign group fighting for an inquiry into the government’s handling of the pandemic; a cause that I instantly felt aligned to when I first heard about them.

 

From the first tentative steps in November 2020, when I wondered whether joining a group of bereaved people might be too overwhelming in the raw newness of my grief, to where I am now, part of the interim campaign team, heading up the volunteer group who look after the National Covid Memorial Wall and one of the official spokespeople for the group, it has been an immersive, enriching journey, one that has corralled and marshalled my grief into something meaningful and productive.

 

The ongoing campaign work has shaped the life I am living now, with a weekly commitment at the wall in London each week where I have found a group of wonderful new friends, and where I meet other people every time who are locked into their own personal hell of bereavement. These conversations are precious glimpses into the lives of other people who are living my experience, and I honour the memories and recollections that are shared with me in brief encounters alongside a wall of 180,00 painted hearts.

 

Being part of the campaign has catapulted me into a political arena, giving me the opportunity to meet  my heroes, the guys behind Led By Donkeys, to meet with the prime minister in the garden of Downing Street, to meet many opposition MPs,  the Mayor of London and the leader of Lambeth Council, to attend the first PMQs open to the public and then to have lunch with Fleur Anderson MP and to meet with a cabinet minister to discuss specialised bereavement support. 

 

It has offered me multiple interviews and airtime on all British and many international media channels, TV and radio and social media. I have learned how to do live to air interviews and keep to the key messages. I have been featured alongside politicians and commentators, speaking on behalf of hundreds of thousands of bereaved families across the country challenging the government in their handling of the pandemic.

 

I have had the privilege of appearing on Newsnight and then being invited back for two further interviews, the latest one with a highlight of Jacob Rees-Mogg MP being unable to look at the screen on which I was speaking. My grandchildren think it is normal to have a Nana on TV, they roll their eyes when they’re asked to be quiet when I appear on the screen.

 

The energy and focus of being part of this group has helped me immeasurably. I have something to do beyond trying to be the person I used to be, doing the things I used to do, and this is incredibly nurturing and nourishing for my new, diminished self. I feel I have something useful to do, on behalf of other people as well as myself. I have a new identity now, associated with the campaign group. 

 

The bitter irony is that the one person who I long to talk to about all this new-found life, all of the media, the focus, the purpose of what I’m doing – that person is gone. 

 

I hope he would be proud of me, 500 days on. I miss him beyond words.

 

 

Funeral Photography

23 November 2021
Fran Hall
5 Comments
Categories: funeral photography, Progressive funeral directors, The future of funerals

Funeral photographer Rachel Wallace 

(Photo credit Louise Winter)

 

On Sunday 22nd November 2021, something magical happened.

 

As the sun rose, Natasha Bradshaw, the inspirational superintendent of Mortlake Crematorium opened the gates to Mortlake’s beautiful grounds, and a trickle of people started to arrive for a  day that would be unlike anything that has ever been done before.

 

People carrying suitcases of changes of clothes arrived in Richmond from all across the south of England, ready to attend a series of staged funeral ceremonies. They were our extras, the mourners for seven fictional individuals whose funerals were taking place as part of the GFG’s Inspirational Funerals photoshoot.

 

The incredible amount of preparation that had gone into the day was evident, as the ceremonies began and lead funeral photographer Rachel Wallace of Farewell Photography and our indispensable second photographer Tracey Anderson started a long day’s work.

 

Funeral directors and celebrants stepped into their roles as if the funerals were real, hearses came and went, rapid costume changes meant black clad mourners reappeared wearing leopard-print outfits and bright coats, coffins were carried, flowers were placed, candles lit and blown out and lit again, beautiful orders of service were handed out and collected, music played, eulogies were read, people cried and laughed and danced and drank mugs of tea, children and dogs ran around and got under everyone’s feet, people watched via webcasts from afar – and everything was captured by the cameras.

 

The ceremonies ran like clockwork throughout the day, under the expert eye of event producer Debbie Malynn, finishing with the welcome words ‘It’s a wrap’ as the light faded and the last images were caught by the lenses. Rachel and Tracey gathered up their equipment, and Natasha and the lovely Mortlake staff tidied up the detritus of the day ready for the real funerals that would take place a few hours later – we didn’t get names, but thank you so much for clearing up after us!!

 

What was this all about, this extraordinary day of role play and expensive props? Why did we draw on the incredible generosity of all of the volunteers who gave up their day to be part of it?

 

It was because we want to show the world how beautiful and inspirational funerals can be, by creating – and then sharing – photographs that can be used by anyone.

 

The gallery of images from Sunday will be made available free of charge to anyone who wants them – for articles, websites, blog posts or social media, for brochures and literature, wherever and however these images are needed, they can be used.

 

We want to change the visual vocabulary about funerals so that everyone everywhere can see just how extraordinary and meaningful a funeral can be.

 

We know how important this is. Currently, stock photos of funerals all reinforce the narrative of sombre faced men in black carrying on their shoulders traditional (MDF) coffins dressed with coffin sprays. Just google images of funerals and you’ll see what we mean.

 

Without changing the visual lexicon, we won’t change the landscape of funerals. No matter how much we want people everywhere to think and talk about funerals, the general psyche is reluctant to do so until it’s absolutely necessary, and by then it’s too late, the social pressure is significant to conform with ‘what everyone else does’.

 

It’s time to change what people see, on as grand a scale as possible. Using pictures that give subconscious messages of ‘all of this is ok’.

 

This was our purpose in putting out a call for support in the Good Funeral Guild – and what an amazing response we had.

 

We want to thank everyone who participated, it couldn’t have happened without the phenomenal goodwill and generosity of everyone involved. You are all complete stars, and you have been part of something that will impact people you will never know or meet.

 

We need to say a particular thank you to the fabulous funeral directors and celebrants who made the funerals so real:

 

Firstly, the lovely Michael Tiney of Southall Funeral Service, whose immaculate cars were there at the crack of dawn for June’s ceremony and whose florist provided her flowers. Thanks to Becky Lee Wale, Daisy Chain Celebrant, who officiated as June’s celebrant. June’s beautiful coffin came from Somerset Willow.

 

Our second funeral for Alma was facilitated by the equally lovely Jo Williamson from Albany Funerals in Kent, with Angela Morgan officiating. The fabulous leopard print hearse was supplied by Green’s Carriage Masters (Jo generously covered the cost of the hire) and Alma’s coffin was created by Coffin Club North London.

 

The third funeral was for Sam, with more lovely funeral directors, Jacqui and Nick Taimtarha of  White Rose Modern Funerals,  Hannah Jackson McCamley (Hannah the Celebrant) leading the ceremony, and a beautiful woollen Natural Legacy coffin from Hainsworth Coffins.

 

The fourth funeral, for Maurice, had the awesome Lucy Coulbert from The Individual Funeral Company rocking up in her LandRover hearse and following car, and a stunning shroud provided by Yuli Somme from Bellacouche. Thanks also to David Holmes of Holmes and Family Funeral Directors for sourcing and bringing a beautiful hand drawn bier which Maurice’s shroud rested on for his outdoor ceremony. The celebrant for Maurice was the wonderful Rosalie Kuyvenhoven of Rituals Today.

 

Rosalie also co-ordinated the last three funerals for Noah, Ariella and May; in a completely ground-breaking part of the day, and with guidance from Natasha who has much experience of looking after baby and children’s funeral ceremonies, we photographed three of these to offer bereaved parents some beautiful sensitive imagery that could help them to begin to think about these most difficult of ceremonies.

 

Rosalie worked closely with Jo Shears from Poetic Endings on these special funerals, with coffins supplied by J. C. Atkinsons and a Swan Wing Cocoon from Bellacouche.

 

We also owe thanks to Suzie White for supplying us with stunning orders of service for the ceremonies – and for also stepping in, alongside her husband, to play particularly difficult roles for the camera.

 

Last of all, thanks to Jane, Isabel and Liv, current GFG directors, and Louise Winter, former Editor of the GFG, for their part in creating this incredible day.

 

This was a collective, tremendously generous effort by a multitude of people – not just those named in this blog post, but all of the other friends and family of members of the Good Funeral Guild who came along and played a part in a day that will change the face of funerals.

 

When the photos appear, you will all see just how worthwhile it was.

 

Thank you everyone.

 

Standardised price lists for all

11 October 2021
Fran Hall
No comments
Categories: CMA Market Investigation, funeral cost, The future of funerals

 

Regular readers of the GFG blog will know that we have been calling for transparency in the funeral sector for well over a decade.

Last month, on 16th September, a seismic shift finally occurred when the Competition and Markets Authority’s Funerals Market Investigation Order 2021 finally came into effect.

All funeral directors in the UK are now required to comply with the Order, which, among other things, requires funeral directors to display price information in a clear and prominent manner, outside their premises, inside their premises and on their websites.

The CMA have specified exactly how information must be presented, with a Standardised Price List (SPL) which must follow the layout and wording supplied by them, an Additional Options Price List and a third price list showing information provided local crematorium operators.

In addition, funeral businesses must also similarly display their Terms of Business and Disclosure of Interests, including stating the ultimate owner of the business.

At last, people looking for a funeral director to help them organise a funeral will be able to compare prices between different funeral directors with ease – at the top of the Standardised Price List there is a total figure for the funeral director’s charges for their services for an attended funeral, below which is breakdown of how this total is arrived at.

The costs for an unattended funeral must also be displayed, and typical figures for burial and cremation fees must also be shown.

It is now, in theory at least, straightforward to compare funeral directors on the prices they charge, which will help people to understand the likely fees that they will be asked to pay – a hugely welcome development after years of opacity and confusion in how prices are displayed by varying businesses.

What we need to see now – and what the CMA will be monitoring – is total compliance from all funeral directors. Seven days after the Order came into effect, a disturbing number of companies seem not to have understood that this new situation is mandatory – we noted a number of well-established and prominent businesses who do not have a Standardised Price List on their website this weekend, while other premises appear to think displaying an A4 size poster at floor level in their window is complying with the Order.

It is incumbent on the funeral trade associations, head offices of large corporate companies and all independent funeral directors to ensure that members and branches are all compliant with the Order.

There is absolutely no excuse for not doing so, and there will be penalties incurred by those funeral directors who continue to fail to provide the information required.

Incidentally, we would add that it is also incumbent on the trade associations to make sure their own funeral houses are in order before using the CMA’s stipulations to attempt to hold businesses outside of their jurisdiction to account – and offering membership as protection.

The Good Funeral Guide have required all our Recommended funeral directors have their prices online for years, so, even though it has been onerous for firms who have always been transparent to follow requirements imposed because of the failure of the sector to be open about prices and ownership, we warmly welcome the CMA’s intervention.

It is regretful that this has been necessary. It is regretful that there still appear to be companies that don’t feel bereaved people deserve the courtesy of knowing what prices will be charged before they start making arrangements for a funeral. It is more than regretful, in fact, it is shameful.

If you come across funeral directors who aren’t displaying the mandatory documents, or if you happen upon a funeral director website that doesn’t have the Standardised Price List just one click away from the home page, do please let the CMA know, in confidence if you prefer. They are keen to hear about companies who are not complying.

The CMA Funerals Team can be contacted on funerals@cma.gov.uk

Isolation

16 July 2021
Fran Hall
1 Comment
Categories: Absolute Beginner - A Personal Story of Grief

 

Photo credit: Rachel Wallace Photography

Day 271. Almost nine months into this new existence.

The last couple of weeks have been difficult. I’ve been feeling unwell, symptoms of a bad cold which are, apparently, also symptoms of someone double vaccinated who has contracted the Delta variant. A lateral flow test was negative at the beginning of the week, but the Zoe app instructed me to take a PCR test and isolate. So, I’ve been home alone. Wondering if I have caught covid again.

By Friday I had completely lost my voice and had to take part in zoom meetings using the chat facility and miming. On Saturday I discovered that as I hadn’t made a note of the barcode on the PCR test, my missing results couldn’t be traced so I had to wait for another test to be sent out. Dear reader, please make a note of your barcode if you take a PCR test!! This is not mentioned in any of the instructions, nor on the government website, but if your results don’t appear, without that barcode you’re back to square one.

So, I’ve had a lot of thinking time, between coughing. I’ve been trying to work out how I am at the moment.

Fragile, I think, is a good description. I’ve never felt fragile before, but I’ve been conscious of a gradually seeping feeling of anxiety edging up from my subconscious, an anxiety that now seems to be part of my daily existence. On the surface, all is ok, but the slightest stressful thing cracks that veneer and exposes frightening depths of fear and misery underneath. Waiting for the test results has been more stressful than I realised and losing my voice (on top of my ongoing loss of taste and smell since the last time I had covid) was horrible. Isolating again has been really hard.

It feels like I have no idea who I am anymore. Everything is so different now. The me who I used to be has vanished. All the foundations that my life was built on have crumbled and gone, and I don’t recognise myself. Thinking back, I marvel at how strong and confident I used to be, how fearless.

When Steve and I first met, I had built a good life after some difficult times. I had a job I loved, my kids were grown, and I had a fun social life with friends from all over the place. I dated lots of interesting men. I was busy and independent and happy. I wasn’t looking for anything, but then Steve crashed into my life and suddenly everything was in technicolour. I knew it was different at once. I felt completely safe with him, immediately, and that feeling never left me.

When we became a permanent item, everything felt complete. Together, we were so solid, so strong. He supported me in everything I did, he was interested in everything I had to say, we talked and talked about everything, and I only wanted to be with him. Our life together was completely enough, for both of us.

For all the years we were together (other than once, for a few weeks when circumstances were difficult and he needed to exorcise ghosts from his past) – all the rest of the time, those weeks and months and years together were completely immersive and nourishing for us both. We never, ever argued. He was mystified by this, and often wondered why not, but there was nothing to argue about. We were, he sometimes said, like one person in two bodies. Completely unified and solid and strong.

He totally had my back in everything, and his constant strength and love and support made me the best me I could possibly be. He encouraged me, and counselled me, and laughed at me and made me laugh too, and he was always, always there. If we were apart, we’d speak on the phone throughout the day, but mostly we were together as much as humanly possible. It was the easiest, most perfect relationship I have ever had. We completed each other. Constant, complete love. We occasionally appreciated just how lucky we both were to be experiencing so much security, so much safety, to be both adored and adoring, but mostly we just thrived and grew, separately and together.

With his grounding, I could fly, and I did. I became a stronger voice, a more determined advocate for what’s right, a better contributor to the discourse about the subjects I cared about. I could write and speak and lead, I became better known, better respected, just better generally. Always with his advice, his balanced Libran opinions in the back of my mind. I listened to him and tempered my more extreme ideas; I grew stronger and wiser. He kept me on track, but never stifled me. He was the perfect counterbalance.

And now he’s gone. The me that I had become, the me that had blossomed from the fertile soil of love and support and interest and generosity that he had poured into my growing – that me died with him last year. There is absolutely no way I can be that person anymore, not without him. I am left staring at the wreckage of my life, trying to find the bits that can be fitted back together in some resemblance of that person I used to be, knowing full well that it’s impossible.

This, I suppose, is the long, hard work of grieving. Of reassembling, re-membering who I am. Working out which bits of me still resemble the me I used to be and can be useful in the future, and which bits are lost forever. It’s difficult to get the perspective you need when you’re dealing with the ebbing and flowing of grief; self-analysis is difficult at the best of times, let alone when your heart feels like it’s shattered into a million pieces. I have to do it in dribs and drabs, noting when I feel like me (rarely), and accepting when I feel like someone completely other (the rest of the time).

I’m at my best when I’m assuming my old persona, when I’m working. It’s like putting on a familiar coat, being the Fran that people recognise. I can be effective and decisive and have opinions that I can back up, I can focus and pull things together like I used to do. But the minute I stop – and I can’t yet keep it up for long – the minute I switch off the computer or end the zoom call or hang up the phone, I feel the illusion of normality dissolve away, and the now familiar uncertainty wash back over me.

I can push it away by distracting myself too, by walking, by letting my subconscious thoughts surface as I go, my brain creating some order of the random memories and thoughts and fears. I can focus for a while on writing, or on tracing my family tree on Ancestry.com, or on reading or baking or gardening or cleaning and tidying – all these things help a bit with managing how I feel. But there’s an underlying ache that never goes away. And none of my distractions help me piece myself together into the new me. I don’t know how to do that. I don’t know where to start.

I don’t know how to carry my grief into situations either. With people close to me, it’s not a problem. Steve is a presence in our conversations, despite his absence, his existence is acknowledged, and his importance is accepted. But with other people, people I know less well, I don’t know how to be, how to bring Steve with me.

He either becomes the central player in my tragic story of being someone who married the love of her life and then lost him to covid three weeks later, or an awkward unmentioned ghost who hovers over conversations until I invite him to join us by mentioning him – at which point the tragic story takes centre stage and changes everything. How do I introduce myself, trailing this invisible ghost with me? How do I navigate conversations when I know he’s there and the other person doesn’t? At what point do I detonate the hand grenade of the horror of what I have experienced and let the pieces of my story fall over someone I’m talking to? It’s too huge, too horrific, too difficult to precis into a sentence or two.

I’ve done this once or twice and it is gruelling, for me and for the other person. Ghost Steve is as big and strong as real Steve was, and once he’s involved in a conversation, he draws all the oxygen from it. He’s better contained when he’s pre-framed by my identity as someone bereaved by covid, in my role within the community and as a spokesperson of the campaign group Covid-19 Bereaved Families for Justice. Ghost Steve behaves better in that scenario, he’s easier to accommodate and reference. I feel safer and more recognisable in that place too, with him pre-introduced. I am beginning to find whisps of my old confidence coalescing into the new, ‘tragic’ me.

So, when I’m working, check. When I’m doing something purposeful with my grief, check. The rest of the time, I’m fumbling along trying to look after myself and be patient. The only way to survive a loss like this is to keep going. Eventually, after enough time has passed, I hope that I will one day have gathered enough pieces of my old self together again to be recognisable to myself. I hope that I will have more time feeling strong and less time feeling lost, less time ambushed by the tears that well up unannounced, less time feeling stabs of envy at seeing couples together, less time feeling completely alone.

This week of enforced lost-test-imposed isolation has brought my actual real isolation into sharp relief. I am alone now. I am without my anchor. The rest of my life will be lived without Steve. I cannot fill the gap that he has left with anything or anyone. I have to grow the new me around the hole where he used to be. This is the most difficult thing I have ever faced, the hardest task I’ve ever been given. There’s no escaping from it, no other path to take. Oh, and there’s still a global pandemic raging. And a government seemingly determined to wash their hands of keeping us all safe.

I think feeling fragile is a reasonable thing right now.

Poetry and signs

26 May 2021
Fran Hall
1 Comment
Categories: Absolute Beginner - A Personal Story of Grief

A dear friend sent me a poem at the weekend. Technically, she re-sent it, she had shared it with me soon after Steve died, so the words were familiar, and yet the second I started to read them, the fragile skin I have so painfully grown over the depthless well of tears inside me fell apart, and I cried and cried.

It has been 220 days since Steve died. I have no idea how I have survived 220 days without him. To all intents and purposes, I am ‘doing well’. I keep being told this. I have no idea against what I am being measured. There isn’t anything to measure how I’m doing against.

The me who I was when Steve was alive died with him. Of course it did. Everything changed in that moment. And in the hours and days and weeks that followed him dying, I changed too. I have no idea who I actually am now. On the surface, I look and sound like the old me. A wearier, older, sadder me, but there’s enough of me left to be reassuring to others.

I can function now, I’m working, writing, doing admin, sorting invoices, attending meetings, giving people advice, doing what I have always done. But to be honest, I don’t know what else to do with myself. If I didn’t distract myself with work, or with looking after the children, or with doing the shopping and cooking and cleaning that needs doing, the weight on my shoulders and in my heart would drown me.

For a brief time, being involved with the National Covid Memorial Wall caught me up in a feeling of purpose. Being proactive and doing something for other people really helped turn me away from my pain, and my involvement with the campaign group continues to buoy me. I’ve been asked to be part of a sub-group working on government support for people bereaved by covid, and that is really important to me, I will throw myself into it and have already secured support for our efforts from some of the leading people in the field of complicated grief and bereavement.

Acting as one of the media spokespeople for the group is good for me too, and I will happily speak to journalists when I’m asked to. All this is positive, helpful stuff. But the yawning emptiness inside me, beside me, stretching ahead of me – it never goes away. And as the community and impact of the wall has ebbed away as the weeks go by, the temporary lift that it gave me slips away with it.

Nobody told me that the days would get harder. Grindingly, relentlessly harder. I suppose that the trauma and shock of the aftermath of Steve’s death was such that telling me such a truth would have been cruel. I’m not sure I could have borne it in those early, mad, broken days. It was enough just to get through each day in one piece, I couldn’t think ahead more than a few hours. I just lived for the moment, like a recovering alcoholic, one day at a time.

I continue to do so, I think. It seems the safest way, in these crazy uncertain times, with roadmaps and variants and insane government decisions. I’m double vaccinated now, so I’m as safe as I can be, but the invisible threat of the virus and the suffocating, choking cruelty of the glass lungs it causes continue to dog my thoughts. I shan’t be doing any socialising any time soon.

To be honest, I don’t feel like I’ll ever want to socialise again. My circle of friends is small, I’ve never been a great keeper of friends, and once I found Steve, he was all I needed. We just loved being together, all of the time, and didn’t need anyone else’s company. Both of us could do a good job of being sociable, he more than me, but we were never happier than when we were alone together, at home. And now I’m alone, at home, and he’s gone. Just typing the words makes me hold my breath.

My shoulders are tense and tight, all the time, unless I consciously make myself relax them. What has happened to me happens to countless thousands of people every year, how on earth did I not realise that so many people are walking around weighed down by the invisible leaden heaviness of being left behind, trying to live without the person who made life worth living?

I miss him so, so much. He was my best friend. My absolute best friend. The person who loved me so much. He knew me completely, as I did him – we saw each other in a way nobody had ever seen me, nor I them. It was such a wonderful, wonderful thing to be known and seen and adored. He didn’t proclaim it publicly, not until we married last year – but that was ok. He had reasons for being circumspect about how he felt about me to the rest of the world.

But I knew, with a knowing that was instant and ancient and visceral and unquestioning, I knew he loved me utterly, as I did him. He used to describe us as one entity split into two beings – I am you, and you are me. I got that, it described how I felt too. We had grown and entwined ourselves into one, over the years, but from the start, we had recognised ourselves in each other.

Seven months have passed. Seven months since my heart was ripped from my body and broken into a million pieces. I try, now and then, to remember that last, precious, irreplaceable hour as he lay dying. I remember that I knew at the time that I needed to try and etch everything in my mind so I would remember, but of course I have forgotten much. I held his hand and didn’t let go, not for a second, I remember that.

I remember that I played him his favourite piece of music using my phone, so that he would have it in his mind as he approached the precipice of death. The theme tune from ‘Out of Africa’. He couldn’t watch the film without crying; when he heard the music, it always made him cry. He spent his early years in Africa, and the film and the music resonated with those early memories of the sunshine and sounds and scents and languages of his childhood.

I chose the track to play when his coffin was carried into his funeral ceremony, and I have heard it only twice since then. It played on the radio as I walked into the living room on my 60th birthday, after being made to wait at the foot of the stairs by my daughters, just I had used to make them wait when they were young. The second time was 6 months to the day after he died; it came on the radio just as we were about to leave the house to go to the woods to visit his grave.

Both times, I cried. We all cried.

I remember telling him how incredible he was, how happy he made me, how much I loved him, how much he was loved by so many people, what a wonderful, wonderful man he was. I remember asking him if he had any regrets, and how he shook his head. I remember him looking up towards the corner of the room and me asking him if he could see someone there and him nodding, and me asking if it was his parents, and him nodding again, and me telling him that they had come to get him, their golden boy, and that it was ok to go with them.

I remember me telling him that he had the heart of a lion, and that he was the best and the bravest person I had ever known. I remember telling him he had to promise to be there for me when I died, and that he must try and let me know if he was still with me and around me after he had gone. I remember telling him that he could let go now, that he didn’t need to keep struggling, that everything would be ok, that I would be ok, that his children would be ok. I remember just trying to surround him with love.

And I remember the moment when he went. The moment that my gorgeous man died in front of me. The moment that he was gone, and his empty shell of a body lay where a millisecond before he had been. That moment will stay with me for the rest of my life.

I’ve often tried to go over that hour in my mind, hoping I will remember more. There must have been so much more, I talked and talked to him for an hour, between the nurses leaving us alone, and me opening the door and asking someone to come in and verify that he had died. I know there’s so much I have forgotten. One of the first times I really let myself go back to that hour and try and really think back to what I said and how it felt was just a few days after his funeral, three weeks exactly after he had died.

 I was walking the dog, thinking and thinking and trying so hard to remember. It was November, and there were leaves on the ground. I remembered the bit of me telling him he had the heart of a lion as I walked, and AT THAT EXACT MOMENT, as I thought that thought, there in front of me, laying in the leaves on the path, was a toy plastic lion.

I picked him up and brought him home and he has sat in front of the photo of Steve and me on our wedding day ever since.

There have been a lot of things that have happened since Steve died. Call them coincidences if you will, but I’m not so sure. White feathers litter my path when I’m walking and thinking about him – where do they all come from? I was walking on the golf course one evening, thinking, of course, about him, and there was one white feather after another on the grass. I said out loud, ‘I’m sick of these bloody white feathers all the time’ and instantly, as clear as a bell, I heard Steve’s voice in my head, saying ‘I gave you a f***ing lion for f***s sake – what more do you want?’ Laughing out loud on your own could easily be taken as a sign of madness, but I stood and laughed and laughed that night.

Are these the signs I asked for? I don’t know. I think they might be, but I don’t know. The one person who I would be talking to about whether I was making myself believe in something that didn’t exist is gone, so I’m left wondering on my own. Nobody knows the answer to this existential question. My thoughts go round and round – where are you? WHERE ARE YOU???

Ultimately, it doesn’t make any difference. He is gone. I am here. I have lost him. I have to be me without him. I don’t know how to do that, but I just have to keep going. One day, I’ll work out who I am now.

I have commissioned a memorial for his grave. It has a carving of a lion, standing on top of the plaque, which has a Swahili phrase on it.

In the film Out of Africa, a love story like no other, the lions come to lay on Denys’s grave.

It feels like the circle has come complete.

 

When I die I want your hands on my eyes:

I want the light and the wheat of your beloved hands

to pass their freshness over me one more time

to feel the smoothness that changed my destiny.

I want you to live while I wait for you, asleep,

I want for your ears to go on hearing the wind,

for you to smell the sea that we loved together

and for you to go on walking the sand where we walked. 

I want for what I love to go on living

and as for you I loved you and sang you above everything,

for that, go on flowering, flowery one,

So that you reach all that my love orders for you,

so that my shadow passes through your hair,

so that they know by this the reason for my song.

Pablo Neruda

The Competition and Markets Authority’s Funeral Market Report – update

29 April 2021
Fran Hall
No comments
Categories: CMA Market Investigation, Regulation of the funeral industry, The future of funerals

 

“Now is not the time”

On April 7th a document published by the Ministry of Justice quietly appeared in the public domain.

It was the government’s ‘Response to the Competition and Markets Authority’s Funeral Market Report’, and it does not make for good reading for anyone who believes that the funeral sector needs to be regulated. Or for the 69% of those who responded to the CMA’s survey who assume it already is.

If, like us, you have been following the progress of the CMA, from the launch of their market study into the funeral market in 2018, you will have seen the case for regulation gradually being developed. After years of painstaking and in-depth work by the team involved, the Final Report, published in December 2020, outlined the serious concerns that the CMA has about the funeral sector. We wrote about it in our blog post in January.

Despite the pandemic having severely restricted the CMA in fully developing all of the remedies that may otherwise have been pursued, the Final Report proposed a number of ‘sunlight’ remedies, intended to improve transparency of pricing and focus on the hidden ‘back of house’ practices in the funeral sector.

In addition, the CMA made one recommendation to government – that:

“The UK government, and the devolved administrations in Northern Ireland and Wales, should establish in England, Northern Ireland and Wales an inspection and registration regime to monitor the quality of funeral director services, as a first step to the establishment of a broader regulatory regime for funeral services in these nations (Scotland already has a similar regime).”

The government has had a think about this, and after a couple of weeks, it told us its decision.

It said no.

While agreeing in principle to a form of regulation and inspection and stating that it believes that ‘such a move in the long term would assist in achieving the overall objective of an improved customer experience’, the government then goes on to make clear it has little appetite to ‘improve customer experience’ in such a way any time soon – now is, apparently, ‘not the time to move to wholescale regulation’.

Instead, the response goes on to outline the next steps that the government is willing to take. Which are not exactly onerous.

Apparently, they will:

  • ‘Work collaboratively with the sector and user groups to develop an agreed set of quality standards (such as a voluntary code of practice), as part of a co-regulatory model, that could be introduced in summer 2021, in parallel with the CMA’s work on price transparency, to achieve a quicker outcome for users of funeral director’s services
  • Support the sector in developing a system to encourage all funeral directors to follow these quality standards and enable users to raise points of concern through a more formalised mechanism than at present
  • Commit to evaluating and reviewing the effectiveness of this co-regulation model
  • Monitor the effectiveness and success of the Scottish regulatory system that has just launched (and which applies to organisations who provide services in Scotland but may be based in Scotland and / or England) after a year’

‘In the context of the ongoing pandemic,’ the government goes on, ‘we believe that this is both a proportionate and appropriate approach.’

Over on Twitter, the Quaker Social Action account noted how bitterly disappointed QSA are with the UK government’s response, “There has never been a more important time for robust action to safeguard bereaved people and ensure that the funerals market is working for consumers” they say.

A statement from Lindesey Mace, manager of the charity’s funeral costs helpline Down to Earth adds that the number of clients they supported doubled during the second peak of Covid-19 deaths between December 2020 and March 2021.

Lindesey continues, “We believe the UK government could, and should, commit far more to protect bereaved people, especially those affected by funeral poverty.”

We at the Good Funeral Guide are wholeheartedly in agreement with Quaker Social Action and share their frustration and disappointment at the government’s decision.

The position of the National Association of Funeral Directors, in contrast, is somewhat different to that of QSA – the NAFD has warmly welcomed the government response in an article on their website, saying:

“The NAFD looks forward to working closely with the Ministry of Justice to demonstrate that our revised inspections regime and comprehensive industry code of practice (The Funeral Director Code), which has been created in consultation with consumer bodies and representatives from across the sector through the work of the FSCSR, and our work to create the Independent Funeral Standards Organisation (IFSO), an independent body which will oversee standards monitoring, inspections and complaints, will provide Government with the assurance it needs that the funeral sector is committed to acting with transparency, high standards and in the interests of bereaved people.”

(The FSCSR is an initiative by Dignity PLC that began in 2018 and was quickly expanded to include other ‘stakeholders’ and an independent chair. The FSCSR is funded “through the funeral industry through the NAFD with additional financial support from Golden Charter, Funeral Zone and Ecclesiastical Planning Services.” We wrote about it in a blog post in 2019 here.)

The IFSO was set up by the NAFD as a ‘new regulator in a previously unregulated space’, according to the advertised role of chair of the board and was done so to ‘provide the Government with a viable solution to address the CMA’s (and our) concerns about the limitations of the current voluntary regulation of the funeral sector,’ as outlined in the article on the NAFD website.

So. In summary.

  1. The Competition and Markets Authority has recommended that government step in and regulate the funeral sector in order to protect and benefit bereaved people.
  2. Government has declined to follow this recommendation.
  3. The National Association of Funeral Directors (the trade association representing the interests of funeral directors) has set up and funded a ready-made ‘independent regulatory body’ as a solution.

We offer no comment on this generous action.

Conclusion

After years of hard work by the team at the CMA investigating the funeral sector, it is dispiriting and dismaying to see their recommendation to government being dismissed.

It feels like a missed opportunity, one that has been 20 years in coming since the Office of Fair Trading Report published in July 2001 called for more openness and transparency, warning that the funeral industry could be taking advantage of bereaved people.

We feel that in choosing not to follow the CMA’s recommendation for regulation, government are ignoring bereaved people and downplaying the vulnerability of bereaved people as consumers.

We would like to ask one simple question to government.

If now is not the time to move to wholescale regulation of the funeral sector, then when will be?

Postscript

While doing research for this article, it was fascinating to come across the new look ‘All Party Parliamentary Group for Funerals and Bereavement’.

It has a shiny new website, and has moved up in the world by including not just MPs, but also members of the Deceased Management Advisory Group  (DMAG) – a collective of organisations representing both funeral directors and those who manage, provide and work in cemeteries and crematoria. The DMAG was formed to address the challenges posed to the funeral sector by the Covid-19 pandemic.

This is a very interesting and new development.

In the past, we have approached the APPG for Funerals many times, requesting that the Good Funeral Guide be allowed to attend meetings with MPs to represent the views of bereaved people (referred to in the full title of the group) but in each instance we have been turned down – although, we were assured in the polite refusals from various Chairs over the years that occasionally guest speakers were invited and one day that invitation might come to us. It never did.

The NAFD historically has been the only outside organisation involved with this particular APPG  – indeed it is referred to by a former President of the NAFD as ‘the NAFD’s APPG’ in an article commemorating the bestowing of Honorary Membership on a colleague – ‘Nigel has been involved with the NAFD’s APPG on Funerals and Bereavement since its inception in 2002 and has worked with 6 different Chairs in that time. All of whom he has ensured have returned excellent value for the NAFD.’

In the past, the APPG for Funerals was the beneficiary of a secretariat funded by the NAFD, however, from a skim through the minutes of the new-look group, a new public affairs agency, JBP Associates appears to have taken over this role. The funding for their services is not apparent in the public register (see page 609, to save you ploughing through all 1,239 pages).

Anyway, we digress. The new ‘APPG for Funerals and Bereavement’ offers direct access to parliamentarians for members of the DMAG, which are as follows:

The National Association of Funeral Directors

The Institute of Cemetery and Crematorium Management

The Society of Allied and Independent Funeral Directors

The Federation of Burial and Cremation Authorities

The Funeral Furnishing Manufacturers’ Association

The Association of Private Crematoria and Cemeteries

The Cremation Society

(You might note the absence of organisations representing bereaved families among the list above, hence why we choose to refer to this particular APPG as the APPG for Funerals.)

According to the APPG for Funerals’ glossy brochure, downloadable here, the first stated intent of the group is:

‘Fair and Proportionate Regulations – We are campaigning on behalf of the sector for fair regulations and suitable legislative change.’

We offer no comment on whether this campaigning is proving effective.

 

The Good Funeral Guide
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