Has anyone been to or experienced a direct crematorium funeral?

[JacknDiane]

I mean the most basic type of funeral you can have, where there's no service or cremation with friends or family involved, basically when you die you get cremated and your ashes get picked up by the family and its up to them what happens next.
I'm looking at costs and the basic one I've outlined above is much more affordable to us.
But I've never experienced anything other than a funeral where you go to the church/or funeral place and the coffin is cremated and music is played and family make speeches eg. attend...then afterwards you go somewhere like a local hotel for tea and sandwiches.

Im just wondering what happens with the most basic cremation if none of this stuff happens.

I know its completely up to the individual and what we can all afford, but I just wanted to hear from anyone who has experienced a basic cremation funeral direct eg. Not a gathering when the cremation took place.

Thank you.

My neighbours didn't have a funeral for their mum. Direct cremation, which as I understand it didn't have any mourners, but they had a memorial afternoon tea in her garden, which was a lovely fitting tribute to her.

You arrange a direct cremation with funeral directors including date
register the death
Registry office send green slip to hospital so they can release deceased to FD
FD notify you they have deceased and will be going ahead on X date. They will also confirm date for ashes to be collected.
Most FD will call you to confirm ashes ready to collect.
That’s it really in a nutshell

A direct cremation is where a person is cremated with no funeral and no attendees. This is what my stepfather requested. My mum was able to see him in the funeral home, and got of choice of cremation date and location (for extra). No one attended the cremation. When the cremation had taken place they delivered the ashes to her.

Weve pre-paid for a direct cremation and the ashes will then be delivered to remaining famiLy. As far as im concerned it will be up to my family what they want to do with the ashes after. They could have a small gathering of family and friends at a suitable time but only if they want to.

another friend had a direct cremation for her DH and kept his urn for a few months before arranging a memorial service at a special place her DH used to go to and there was food and music to celebrate his life.

so you can do as much or as little as you want, when you want.

Just to add. His ashes are still with my mum at home. She has requested that she also have a direct cremation and we find a final resting place for both of them.

We did this for my father. But we did have a separate memorial event. There isn't much to say. It just gets done! My sisters and I also spent some time in the funeral home in a private room with the coffin just before and invited others to do so if they wish (I dont think they did).

It was mainly because we didn't like the local crematoria and certainly didn't want a church. We were also not keen on the whole traditional hearse, carrying in of coffin, presence of a formally dressed undertaker. At the memorial event we could just focus on remembering my father.

MY brother died last September and had requested no funeral. The direct cremation cost £1500, and we collected DB’s ashes from the crematorium. My sister and I are planning to scatter them next spring at the same place we scattered my parents ashes, with as many of the immediate family as can attend - we will just all say a few words about our memories of my brother & then go for a meal somewhere.

We've still not done anything with the ashes as we couldn't decide what was best. Guess my sister will probably just hang on to them as it was a few years ago and the moment has kind of passed...

Have had a couple in the family where we had a "gathering" a few days after the cremation, one in a hotel, one at home. In both cases friends and family came in to remember the deceased, raise a toast and someone spoke about their life.
We did the gatherings on Saturdays to avoid most people needing time off. We bought in food, but tea and cake would have been enough, it was people being together that mattered.
Edit for autocorrect thinking it knows best.

Well, none of us will have attended one because the whole point of direct cremation is no service/attendees!

But that of course doesn’t mean that there isn’t an entirely separate memorial gathering/meal, or an outing to scatter the ashes somewhere meaningful to the deceased.

It only means that there’s no service/no attendees at the time of cremation.

We have them in our family. Person is cremated at some point and the undertaker rings to say come collect the ashes. We have a big family dinner to celebrate their life

My mum. We'll be having a memorial on her 3rd anniversary next year.

There is nothing to attend. Your loved one is cremated in something akin to a factory. The ashes are sent to you. End of.

The funeral directors book a slot with the crematorium, in between other services. They usually tell you the date and time. Then you can pick up the ashes afterwards at some point.

My aunt and uncle both had direct cremation when they died at their request.

To be honest, the only difference between it and other family funerals I've been to was that we weren't at the crematorium. A normal funeral service was still held in their local church with eulogy etc and we had the normal purvey afterwards at the community hall.

My cousins whose parents they were, were happy with the experience. There was a gap between them being cremated and having the funeral but that was their choice since obviously they could have held it at any time.

My aunt & uncle's decision was partly based on the fact that they lived very rurally so travelling between the church and crematorium would have taken a few hours and the service in the church was the most important part for them. It didn't change the feeling of the service not having the body there, but I guess you could have the ashes present.

I know someone whose body was donated to medical science so there was no body for a funeral at that time - you get the ashes years later.

The family had a memorial service with a celebrant in a social club. So if you do go for direct cremation you can still have an ‘offical’ celebration of their life.

Im really interested in this type of service. I hated the crematorium services I have been to. I'd rather friends and family didnt have to endure it and then celebrated knowing me at a wake/party/memorial afterwards. How do you arrnage this? Who do you pre pay to?

My dad has informed me that he'll be doing this,and I'm not sure how I feel. I won't be able to see him afterwards which did help me with my grieving process I think....

Essentially on this route theres no ‘thing’ to go to.

On a traditional approach, you go to watch the ‘disposal’ act. Be that feeding the coffin through the hatch to the incinerator, or into the ground. Theres a bit of preamble to that to make it a ceremony for those there to watch the dispatching.

There’s then often a social get together afterwards.

A while later you get a headstone or a tub of ashes. People sometimes have some kind of event at that point too. Some Dont.

Direct cremation skips the watching the dispatching bit. Fast forwards to the getting the tub of ashes bit.

Can either put them on a shelf, have the crematorium scatter them themselves, or do something else with them.

You also have the option of doing anything or nothing to mark the persons passing. From a full scale large service of thanksgiving for their life in a massive church with a 400 people reception afterwards. To a toast after dinner at home on a Tuesday night.

What it offers is the opportunity to have a reflection and wake type event, where the budget has fewer fixed costs, and the time frame is more flexible.

I've just paid for this and told my son if he wants to arrange a get together at some point he can. We are not religious and I don't want him and other friends and family to go through a funeral. I used Pure Cremation but I'm sure there are other companies around.

Yes we did for my dad. Pure cremation were fantastic with Mum (dad died in September)
We had a memorial service with tea and a sticky bun afterwards a month after he died the ashes weren't back then (held up with coroners)
We will be having a trip to his favourite place next year to scatter the ashes (just close family)....

The funeral directors book a slot to bring the coffin up to the Crematorium. The Pall Bearers bring the coffin into the Chapel (usually with some classical piece of music), the coffin is then placed on the catafalque (raised platform for the coffin). The pall bearers and Crematorium Assistant bow to the deceased and then the curtains are closed for respect. The Crematorium technician will then cremate within 72 hours. The ashes will usually be available with 12-24 hours.

All of DH’s family have done this. Body has been left in hospital morgue until the date of cremation, then collected, cremated and family have been contacted when ashes are available for collection.

Yes. My mother died unexpectedly in another state last year. I saw her in the coffin at the funeral home and then she was cremated. I know she wouldn’t have wanted any extra fuss or anyone else to see her. We held a memorial a month later. It was an impossibly hard choice but she would have hated me spending money on a big complicated funeral. My god I miss her.

They're normally cremated at the slots no one wants,ie the really early ones. I was told you weren't told a date or time until after.