Has anyone ever been to a “bad0 funeral

[Iamnotagoddess]

Discussing with a friend who is supporting another friend who has had a close relative die suddenly.

Didn’t want to go to Co-Op felt it was too “cheap” and have gone elsewhere and are spending 8k.

She cannot afford it.

Does it actually make any difference?

I can’t remember going to a funeral and thinking the funeral was shit other than the obvious actual shitness of it.

When my MinL died we had a horrible experience with the Co op. The celebrant they provided was appalling and the family sacked her and we got the local retired vicar who did a very good job at short notice. My worst experience with them in a professional capacity was when they forgot to pick me up for a funeral and I was standing outside their office in full robes in the early days of mobile phones trying to get someone to come back and get me.

My local branch of Dignity are excellent and we have good independents. I've not had any Coop funerals in years as they prefer to use their own celebrants that they train themselves. If you want a prayer they will say one. If you want a hymn they will do it. They can be a bit vague about my area of work. At one family funeral the celebrant said that he was going to say a poem and started on the Lord's Prayer and was very surprised when my husband and I joined in. Did you know that one he asked us afterwards?

As someone who spends a lot of time with families making the arrangements it is sometimes really hard to get out of families anything about the person who has died. I've been doing this a lot of years and I use all sorts of questions to try and get info for the eulogy if the family don't want to do it. Open questions, closed questions, leading questions, silence and still nothing. Sometimes you just get she loved her family and liked to watch telly. For the family in grief she was just mum and that is enough. I often wish I could talk to best friend who knew her as Ethel and not just mum. I've had families forget to mention previous husbands, children, same sex partners, allegations of child abuse, alcoholism and more that come out in the chats with family and friends before the funeral. I had someone try and throw himself on the coffin as it went into the grave. No idea who he was.

From someone in the business do get quotes and if you aren't happy you can change funeral director or request another celebrant or minister. Most funeral directors will not charge for funerals of those under 18. The direct to crem funerals are becoming more popular. Instead of a funeral with a body there is some sort of celebration or memorial service with the ashes present as the cremation has already happened. It felt odd the first time I did it but it worked well for the family as there were no time pressures over available crem slots.

I saw an documentary about co op funeral parlours .
Was absolutely shocking the way they stored the bodies and pressured families into paying more for their so called basic packages

At my grandad’s funeral, the celebrant got my Mum’s name wrong and even got the cause of death wrong (think after a long illness/quickly).

Nothing will beat my brother bringing his future wife (who we were meeting for the first time) who proceeded to make horrible comments to my mum.

Thanks for link, happyhippo, very useful.

Mum”s funeral was organised by the Coop and was exactly what we wanted. Their attention to detail was very good and the respect they showed to mum was exemplary.
My mum’s vicar wanted to rearrange the date and time to suit him and after consulting with us ( we didn’t want him to conduct it - long story) they dealt with that taking a whole load of pressure off the family.
Bad funerals - just one. They mixed up the music so in the somber reflective part - they played Gracie Fields ‘wish me luck as you wave me goodbye....’. That was an independent funeral director. They also forgot the flowers.

One of the responsibilities of a celebrant (if you're using the local crematorium) is to somehow keep the ceremony to the right time length without making it feel rushed. This is also IMO the hardest bit of the job on the day, if you have friends/family giving tributes. (The first funeral I did, which was for a friend, had four different people speaking. Three of them went right off-script and I was petrified we would overrun...)

I was stuck at lights opposite a co op funeral home a few months ago. They were loading the coffin into the hearse obviously ready to start funeral proceedings. There was no family or friends. Just the co op staff and I was genuinely touched by the obvious respect they had for the person they were transporting. They were so careful and once onboard and ready to go, they all bowed to the coffin. It wasn’t done for any family benefit, purely respect for the deceased.

I hadn’t expected that of co op as I Viewed them as a bit low end in the funeral market but it has changed my opnion of them

We used co-op and thought they were fab compared to the dodgy place that did my Grandma. They sewed her mouth up without her teeth and the results were.... interesting.

I know I am ‘weird’ in this way. I just think even if people sit/stand and say nothing it’s enough. They don’t need to be told about me by a stranger. So yea that’s a bad side for me.

Our council charged you £200 even if you only over ran by seconds. One was 48 seconds. Went on for absolutely ages despite community outrage. It was only when the local paper campaigned about it that they actually stopped it.

Now they have a three strikes and you're [funeral directors] out policy. The FD's would have to book extra long services for their cremations for every one for three months.

Either way the people paying for the funeral will get stung :(

FizzyIce I used coop in the summer this year and the lady there was adamant that it was coop policy not to charge any more than absolutely needed, as it happened I was in the position that I wasn't concerned about cost and made that clear, but she was not going to take a penny more than needed from me, stating that was company policy. I wonder if this has changed since you saw the documentary?

@wonderstuff Possibly, it was about 3 years ago .
It was so bad I would assume they’d have had to change tact to stay in business and not close down .
Glad to hear they have improved by the sounds of it , it’s the last thing you need to worry about when burying a loved one

wonderstuff that was my experience too, they advised me that flowers from an independent florist may be less expensive, a veneer coffin would be perfectly fine because it was cremation, and everything was mix and match pricing, completely transparent. Also the humanist celebrant sent me her eulogy to proof read and amend prior to the day, so there were no mistakes.

We went for the absolute cheapest when my DF died - not because we begrudged it, but because he was the type who would buy the cheapest if there was a penny‘s difference.

DM was afraid he’d come back and haunt us all if we wasted money on his funeral!

I’ve been to a number of funerals and I can’t say that DF’s was any worse.

At one family funeral the celebrant said that he was going to say a poem and started on the Lord's Prayer and was very surprised when my husband and I joined in. Did you know that one he asked us afterwards?

Crikey. These 'celebrants' popping up left right and centre scare me. Some of them don't know the first thing about the job they're supposed to be doing.

Cardboard coffins are not the cheapest option, trust me!!

We’ve organised 4 funerals with the same independent director recently and they’ve been amazing. Equally another independent director did my friends funeral with over 200 in attendance and it was equally as beautiful.
The celebrants make the biggest difference IMO, as well as the eulogy, poems, etc.

Having said that, the co op have a big warehouse near me and I just don’t like the fact there’s a warehouse with “co op funeral” written on it. So I wouldn’t use them on that basis (daft reason, I realise!!)

aawwww I wanted to read about terrible funerals with aunts hawking out their MLM business and brawls.

WTF is it with people who think the Co-Op is 'cheap'? My MIL is like this and goes on about how her mother (lovely woman but with a touch of the Hyacinth Buckets) insisted on being buried by anyone but the Co-Op. She and her mother obviously think/thought that a Co-Op funeral is 'common'. She always looks bemused when I remind her that my dad, who was posh enough to scare the life out of her (not deliberately - he had no idea anyone thought he was posh) and who was famous enough in his field to have an obituary in a couple of national papers and have senior colleagues come from around the world for his funeral, was buried by the Co-Op. They did a brilliant job and I got a load of Co-Op points which I spent on very nice red wine as a fitting tribute to him

One of the responsibilities of a celebrant (if you're using the local crematorium) is to somehow keep the ceremony to the right time length without making it feel rushed. This is also IMO the hardest bit of the job on the day, if you have friends/family giving tributes. (The first funeral I did, which was for a friend, had four different people speaking. Three of them went right off-script and I was petrified we would overrun...)

I would agree with this. When I've celebrated funerals I've always ensured that any family/friends' tributes are before my eulogy that I can a) omit anything in mine which is going to be repetition and b) cut mine respectfully and adeptly short if required. You have to thank on your feet if there are tributes other than the eulogy, and also have to be ready to step into the breach if someone who was going to offer a poem or short reading finds themselves overcome by emotion.

The only bad funerals I've been to are when they're not about the person. Particularly when it's a religious service and the celebrant goes all pious and bangs on about the afterlife when the person wasn't remotely religious. It's like they've got their captive audience and are making the most of the spotlight.

The best ones are always when the essence of the person really comes across. And you learn some things about them that you didn't know: how they used to play in a band, or had a private pilot's licence or that they were a fantastic knitter. That the music played is their favourite songs rather than a turgid hymn.

None of it relates to the money spent. No one cares how much the coffin cost or if there were sandwiches or mini quiches afterwards. What you remember is what was said.

I agree that it's not the money spent, but the tributes.

So if they can't afford it then they'll be getting into debt?

Ridiculous!

Most cultures have standard funerals. In Italy you bury people within 48 hrs. However the standard funeral includes a mass with no personalisation. This is common in most cultures where burial is quick. In this country we have more time so can organise more of what we want and have eulogies etc. I have also been to a Muslim funeral and there were no eulogies there either. I personally prefer British funerals to the ones in Italy. They feel less rushed and more about the person who has died. Even Catholic funerals here seem to allow a short eulogy at the end after the service is done.

There is probably a minimum standard I guess and comfort for guests.

However the worst funerals I’ve been are ones without personal touches. I went to a relations one full catholic funeral. They were a nasty person in life, and alcoholic. The whole funeral was packed with people who came as they were a ‘respected family’ - and the hypocrisy made me feel actually sick.

I really really really don’t want my family to spend any more than the bare minimum on my funeral.

I’m planning to offer my body to science, then after that a cheap cremation. Family can make their own decision what they do with my ashes but I’d like just to be scattered in a place I like.

But to answer your actual question (d’oh!) I’ve only been to one ‘bad’ funeral and that was because it was the lady’s estranged daughter who did a bunch of readings, completely omitted any mention of my mum and my family despite the fact that she’d not been in contact for ~10 years and my mum had cared for her.

She also sold all her own mothers possessions before the funeral which included lots of personal things from my grandad who was her late partner.

It was over a decade ago and it still upsets me.