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.

I've never been to a funeral where I'd even notice the surroundings, or things that have or haven't been paid for
The only time I've been to funerals that have been spoilt it's by peoples unreasonable behaviour (I was so angry with my family who all, apart from my dad and I turned up late and made a racket coming in mid service, also one where a kid had died in a car accident and the driver tried to come to the funeral which understandably upset the family)

The funerals of my PIL both involved poetry written and read by one of my sisters-in-law...She is very, very bad at writing poetry... Vogon levels easily. As a result of that - and a couple of poems at weddings written by friends of the bride - the main thing I have told my husband and child is that there is to be no poetry at my funeral - unless the writer has been dead for at least 50 years and the poem has been published in at least two major anthologies...

ivykaty44
I agree a lot of the local funeral directors have been bought out by dignity
Often on the website and advertising they appear to be a local family run business but when you actually look at the small print they are owned by dignity
As I posted before dignity and coop wanted almost £1500 more for pretty much the same funeral / cremation
My relative would have haunted me to the end if I paid that much more and didn’t actually get anything more for her money

My husband's cousins funeral was a bit mad. He had died by suicide in his 30s. Very tragic.
During the funeral one of the mourners stood up, shouted "Me Bollox" and stormed out slamming the church door
The afterwards several guys with baseball bats showed up and gave chase to a car full of other mourners who raced out of the church car park at speed.
DH's cousin had some colourful friends.

Schadenfreude - I always very gently ask those who will be speaking to send me their planned speech on the grounds that, if they are too upset to continue, I have it in my script and can take over if necessary. (The other reason is, of course, so I can adjust whatever I planned to say for either length or repetition.)
I did trust one friend without a script at his father's funeral as I knew he was a professional entertainer and would get the timings right - he asked me how long he should speak for and I said, 5-10 minutes at his discretion.

The only 'bad' funeral I've been to was my nanas, nothing to do with the funeral parlour (other than they recommended the vicar!). For whatever reason someone decided to have a religious service for a woman who was super anti-religion, the vicar got everything wrong- he got her name wrong, her husbands name wrong, my late dads (and her son) name wrong, dates and other important events that he'd been asked to include were missed or he got them wrong. It was shocking.

My dads funeral however was co-op and a humanist service with a guy they recommended and it was lovely, exactly what he would have wanted and actually the people there were amazing! Really comforting and understanding and couldn't have done more for us.

I don't see the point in spending unaffordable amounts on a funeral, as long as it's a heartfelt tribute to the deceased you don't need to throw thousands at them.

We used Co-op for my Mum. They were amazing. DSis and I arranged as Dad couldn’t cope. We live at opposite ends of the country so all done via email after one short meeting. They got everything right, especially the flowers - based on a one line mention by my Dad of my Mums wedding bouquet (only black and white photos so no help there).

Nothing about it was ‘cheap’. Lovely cars, hearse, respectful staff. Everyone said it was a lovely send off - in fact I wrote to say thank you after the day as we’d had so many compliments. They made a difficult time much easier.

I think the most important things are a good celebrant, feeling like the day reflects the deceased and the ability to mentally unpack at some sort of social event after (preferably with booze but no expectation of a free bar). The rest - not so much.

DH’s dad’s funeral was tricky as DFIL’s brother decided to mention his three ex wives despite the fact that only EX2, MIL, was in attendance, that was hard for her. I get that he was giving the full picture but frankly I think funerals are for the living, they remained good friends and seeing as Ex1 and Ex3 couldn’t be arsed to show up I felt it was a bit horrible.

My favourite funeral was my uncles. My cousins picked Emile Sande’s Read All About it for the moment the coffin curtains close - very beautiful, even if not really what uncle would have wanted - and after 30 seconds the record scratches and they realise it’s the rap version. DUncle went to his eternal resting spot to the dulcit tones of Professor Green... and the lyrics are about how shit his dad is. DUncle would have found it utterly hilarious

Lol at the coop being cheap.

I don't think any funerals are cheap these days. There's just expensive and even more expensive. Are you actually trying to say that they're 'common' OP?

We used the Coop for my dad's funeral and they were brilliant. Can't fault them one bit. And it was still knocking on nearly £3500 and that was straight to cremation and didn't include the wake and the flowers (obviously)

I've had two family funerals at a large London crematorium, I did find the facilities severely lacking in ambience. I only noticed in passing, didn't really care. If no-one else was bothered I'd have preferred not to have funerals.

I was a bit surprised at what it was like, but wouldn't bother doing anything different next time.

When I organised my husbands funeral I went with what I thought was an independent small chain but are in fact a subsidy of the co-op.
Didn’t matter as they did a wonderful job tailoring everything to comply with what my husband and I wanted. The celebrant came to the house and spent a good couple of hours with me, asking about my husband and our family. Even though the celebrant was a minister he didn’t try to persuade me to have a religious reading. He read the paradoxical commandments instead and he lead the mourners in singing my husbands football team anthem at the end. It wasn’t the official version either but a recording we had found from a game my husband had attended so somewhere amongst the voice was his.

The funeral was not cheap and came to just over £5k not including flowers and wake which we arranged separately but it was worth every penny as it gave my husband the send off he wanted.

The Co-op funeral care is really good. I'm from a financially hard off professional middle class family and it was all that we could afford for one of my relatives. I don't think anything was lacking at all.

My mother's. I was so disappointed, and it cost a lot. I hadn't been to many and didn't really have any help with it. It was crap.

We used the Coop and they were really good, fab staff and I would certainly not hesitate to recommend our local one and it was recommended to us.

The whole cost was under £4K and this included our own costs for a wake for 80 people which was catered by friends and family but was pretty lavish eg lots of champagne as well as lots of fancy food.

We could have paid extra for a fancier coffin or more flowers and didn't need cars as church is bang opposite the house.

Tombstone was extra.

I went to a crem funeral where the vicar kept looking at his watch. It did feel rushed and it’s totally put me off crem funerals

I work for the council bereavement dept... Bad funerals are usually the family causing drama. Funeral directors are pretty much same across the board.

@Gabrielknight then they must all be awful then. I was left totally alone with no help or guidance. I certainly did not cause any drama. When I asked for advice the undertaker shrugged and said it's up to you. Sounds like you're the same...

It's definitely down to whoever is giving the eulogy and the quality of information they've been given. Everything else is pretty irrelevant unless the mourners are up for a barney.

Has anyone heard of neocremations.co.uk/ services?

I don't understand lavish funerals. The deceased one won't care how many batches of flowers did you order or what food was there

Yes to bad funerals, but not to do with the cost. And I've been to hundreds! (Former organist).

I have a personal preference for traditional pallbearing (on the shoulders, no hands whilst walking, no trolley). That's not always relAted to the cost of the funeral.

And I always feel a bit sad to see very expensive coffins. I sometimes wonder whether the family have felt obliged to spend more than they can afford. I want the cheapest coffin available!

I’ve been to ones where the wake venue and food was terrible

In my limited experience the 'best' funerals are ones where people who knew the deceased speak about them, or sing a song, or read a poem, with less input from the officiant. I have paid attention to which company organised the funeral apart from seeing the name on the order of service.

Sorry should say 'never paid attention'.....

A friend of mine & his wife had to go into significant debt to bury his MIL.

The family had very fixed ideas about what doing it "properly" would look like but much less desire about paying for any of it. Friend was guilted into taking out a loan as he was the only one with access to credit.

MIL had expressed no desire for any of this and would have been appalled that they spent the next 3 years paying for her funeral (noone else offered a penny).

There was also a massive fight (with fists) at the wake over who was going to get this and that from her house. Absolute shower.

So yeah, I'd say that was a bad funeral even though it cost close to £10k and apparently there was much slapping each other on the back re: the good send off they'd given her.