Beware of the Package

Last week I was speaking with a woman about the death of her husband.  She told me that she thought the funeral home industry was a racket because they made her pay for a package deal at the funeral home to get her husband cremated.  This package had services that she did not want and did not use.  She did not know what to do but to follow what the funeral home had told her and pay for things she did not want or use.  I informed her that in no way was she ever obligated to pay a package deal at a funeral home.  She had the right to pay only for the services she wanted to use.  We all have this right living in the US to pay only for the services and goods that we use at the funeral home.
 
I was not at that sales meeting and I do not know what was said.  What I do know is that these meetings are sales meetings.  In the final analysis, meetings with a funeral director end up as a sales meeting mostly because this is how the funeral home stays in business.  She felt she had no other recourse in dealing with the funeral home but to purchase the package and get her husband’s body cremated.  What she could have done, and what I would tell anyone to do is to shop around.  Never do business with a funeral home that does not feel right to you.  We all know what it feels like to be in a sales meeting and feel the pressure to buy.  Some of us might acquiesce to sales pressure more easily in mourning, and that is why we have the federal law, the funeral rule.
 
In this whole thing lies the problem of the package.  These package deals are set up to be easy for consumers to purchase.  They are what the funeral home wants us to see as typical services and goods they can provide for us in our “time of need”.  These packages become the easy way for those in grief to resolve the question of what to do now that the person they love has died and the body must be cared for.  These packages do not typically include services that a family might want if they want a simple no frills, perhaps even a home funeral. If we wish to have a simple visitation and keep our bodies natural, we need to find a sympathetic funeral director who can help.  They are there, but we have to look.  Looking and researching at the time of need is often so difficult to do, and that is why funeral homes have package deals.
 
In the end, do not feel that the package deal offered by a funeral home is ever the only way to go.  If you do not use a service or a product, you do not have to pay for it.  That is the law.  Research local service providers in your area so that you know who you will want hired to care for your body and those you love when the time come.