Why do funerals cost so much money

[Frickssake]

Read recently that a standard funeral can cost upwards of 3k, cremation not being much cheaper. I know you can pay for a funeral plan etc but 3k plus! I'm off to look if there's a cheaper way when I go!

DH's funeral cost about £5k. That was for a cremation, humanist service, second cheapest casket with nice handles (DSS and DS didn't like the standard handles), obituary in newspaper and online, two cars plus hearse, wake at the British Legion club with hot and cold buffet. Was a beautiful funeral (if you can say that about the saddest day ever) and completely planned by DH and I in the weeks before his death. He had a friend who was a funeral director so we used his parlour. My parents paid the funeral costs upfront and I paid them back when I had sorted out bereavement support allowance and pension payouts.

@peak2021"
OP, having a direct cremation and then your nearest and dearest having a separate memorial event or service may be the answer to your wish"

Unless I donate my body to MS- although I'm hearing conflicting reviews whether the body is returned so may need to do some investigation around this

It's like most things if you want lots of cars, lots of flowers, an expensive coffin, burial etc it will mount up.

For my DM we had one car, I sorted the flowers out. One of the cheapest coffins because it's not something that seemed necessary to spend a lot of money on.

However, we spent a lot of money on a good grave headstone as that will be around for many years and food and drink for her wake so people could remember her and say their goodbyes.

In total we paid around £4K around 8 years ago but about 1k was just the headstone.

I’ve donated my body to the university too & they’ve accepted it, unless I go up to 14 stone, or I die when university is closed then the deal’s off.

My mums funeral 2.5 years ago, private funeral, no service, graveside only, no wake. Just as she wanted. Undertakers bill was just under £3k that included opening the grave. She had already bought the plot years before. Then a couple of months later we got the bill for the headstone which was another £1100, unbelievably expensive but its a granite headstone, just as she wanted. She had insurance policies and savings to pay for it all.

You are paying for the coffin, the services of the funeral director to collect your loved one, look after their remains for typically 2-3 weeks, dress them as you request and allow visits to say goodbye, provide professional services on the day, the cremation/burial fees, orders of service, any clergy/celebrant you request, music eg organist, flowers. The cost to have the service at a c of e church is approx £450 (I organise them) but increases if you ask for extras.

To save money I can suggest a direct cremation and have a service of thanksgiving/celebration of life with or without a celebrant afterwards when you scatter the ashes, if you want a traditional funeral eg at church you can completely diy with an estate car, order a coffin online, book burial/cremation yourself etc - I've had this before. Some funeral directors do a basic package but they do not include cremation fees in that price remember. Main saving points if you don't want to go the whole diy route are to use recorded music and print your service booklets yourself, funeral directors charge a fortune (some churches will print them for you at cost).

@Turnedouttoes

It's paid for by his estate, if no family or friends are willing to organise then the council will but there won't be an invite for family to attend (it will be at 9am and a representative from social services plus a duty celebrant.) Social services will get first priority on the estate to pay for it, as would family if they organise it.

I never knew about direct cremation until David bowie did it. If it's good enough for him, it's good enough for me! Havr told dh and dc that's what I want. If they do it differently it's up to them

@Oblomov20

You can do much of it eg provide pall bearers, do the flowers, print orders of service, no extra cars etc whilst still using a hearse and funeral director for the care but

The first thing my mother did for my stepgran after my grandfather died was organise her funeral as my stepgran didn't have capacity and my mum wanted to make sure everything was in place for her death, so not only was she organising my grandfather's funeral she was organising a funeral plan for my step gran. the bank manager gave my mum lowest sum possible to put to a funeral because if it was left to step grans family theyd have given her a paupers funeral while living off her money. And it was the most basic of funerals and had no choice but to have her buried with her first husband, she wanted to be buried with my grandfather but nobody had heart to tell her my grandad was cremated as his wishes. So the bank only gave us what they thought a funeral was worth and I think it was just over 2 thousand. It was horrible we were her only family members there her blood relatives who skimmed money off her for years didn't bother to show up. I lowered her into the ground it was awful.

Was £4000 for my dads last month. It was only £10 to have it recorded. It also was cheaper than the florist flowers which I ended up paying £110 for because my test of a sister said the funeral directors were too expensive.

I suggested a cardboard box but actually as it needs to be a certain weight it was 10 times the price I could have done it for myself:

@sansou

What I learnt from my aunt's funeral a few years ago is that a cardboard coffin wasn't as cheap as a laminate version and there was a premium uplift for seemingly the ecological friendly options. I pointed out to my cousin that she was being cremated so maybe, an expensive coffin was literally burning money and wouldn't have been what my frugal aunt would have wanted.

You can’t cremate in a cardboard coffin either (nor wicker from memory) because they burn too fast compared to the body

There really should be a service for people like me, who don't care about funerals at all, to be placed in a clinical waste sack and incinerated along with hospital waste etc.

You can’t cremate in a cardboard coffin either (nor wicker from memory) because they burn too fast compared to the body

You can have wicker or willow. Both my parents had willow coffins for their cremations.

I think it's very unfair to denounce all FDs as callous rip-off merchants. I'm sure there will be unscrupulous ones out there - like in every industry - but the majority are dedicated people, doing a job that not many people would want to do, and earning a living/running a profitable business in doing it.

There are loads of options that they make you aware of, but I've never known FDs to be at all pushy if you decline. It's not like the options will be open to you months later: you have to decide what you want pretty quickly. Lots of people might be greatly disappointed only to learn months after the event that they could have had/done something small but really meaningful for the funeral.

Every deceased person and their families are different, and they deal with their grief and wish to pay tribute to and remember their loved one. You personally may hate the idea of releasing doves or a horse-drawn carriage for the coffin, but for others, this may be the moment that defines their loved one and what they meant to them. Don't forget: like with weddings, there are some people who actively want all of the bells and whistles and fanfare, and don't object to paying for it all.

Even though you're grieving, you still surely realise that, just because you may have the option of a 24-carat solid gold coffin, it will cost you a fortune if you go for it.

Also, most funeral directors will charge nothing or a heavily-reduced amount for children's funerals, even though their costs still have to be met and wages paid.

My loved one was nearly 98 and very ill, so her death was hardly a surprise to us. Like many elderly people, she'd had lots of time to save up and have a decent amount of assets.

If any proportion of the cost of her funeral - paid from her savings and thus overall a little bit less for us in the family to inherit - goes towards helping fund the provision of a free funeral for a child who tragically dies in the same area, and eases the sudden financial burden on utterly distraught parents whose world has just come crashing down, and who likely also have other children to keep providing for - I am very glad indeed for this to happen.

Cremations have gone up in price for 2 reasons:
The furnaces are generally gas-fired and the price of gas has gone up enormously
In general, people are heavier, which means more fat and this takes more energy to dispose of.

Regarding the hearses. They may appear to be built on a standard car such as a Ford or Volvo estate, but there the difference ends.
I used to buy my paper on the way to work from a paper shop near to Southern Cemetery in Manchester where the owner was a retired copper. He used to do work occasionally for a funeral director where I lived if they needed another pall bearer at short notice. He knew I liked cars. He told me about a fantastic day out he'd had - the funeral director in Knutsford was buying a new hearse and had a new one to test drive. The south Manchester crematorium is out at Dunham Massey near the National Trust property - lots of narrow roads with bends. He told me the best bit was the engine - this was in about 2004 or 2005. As a standard, the hearses this funeral director was looking at came with a Cosworth V6 engine probably 6L or thereabouts.
You have a heavy coffin, a body, possibly up to 20stone in weight, a driver and 6 x 6ft tall men with enough muscle to shoulder and carry the coffin and the deceased. They tend to be matched for height for obvious reasons, so that the coffin doesn't tip and start to slide off the shoulders of the shortest pall bearer.
The car with an engine of that size and type will not be cheap, neither will the maintenance of the engine - the last thing that needs to happen is for the hearse to break down on either the way to the cemetery /crematorium or on the way back.

He'd been a police driver, driving police spec Range Rovers and Senators but he told me that driving a car with a large Cosworth engine around the twisting lanes of Dunham Massay was some of the best fun he'd ever had.

We recently had my mum's funeral; it was a cremation and no wake afterwards obviously. It cost about £4500 and that was with one of the coffin inserts.

Just organising my fathers funeral and its very basic costing £1700.

Thats a cremation, 25 minute service, fees, coffin, hearse and on line order of service.

Dad didn't want a big fuss and thought all the extras were a waste of money and I agree with him having now had numerous quotes ranging from £2000 to £7000!!

DF & DM died just over 2 years apart. Both funerals were virtually the same except we paid for a double plot in the Council run lawn cemetery at £1000 for Dad. Council charged £500 to open it up again 2 yrs later for Mum. We had one less hearse for Mum's funeral as we travelled in our own cars whereas she wanted us in the limo with her for Dad's. Both funerals were around the £4k mark - not including the wake, which cannot be charged to the Estate as that is down to the next of kin to pay for.
Our adult DD died same year as DM and her funeral and burial was only £2900 - different area to my parents and churchyard burial rather than Council cemetery. So huge regional differences in price.

Gravestones are an additional expense for a burial too (6-12 months later) with a stone costing around £1200 - another cost attributable to the next of kin.

My mums funeral is on Wednesday.

It’s cost £5.5k, obviously without a wake or limousines. She had a funeral plan with the co-op for £3.5k, we made the choice between us to pay extra for a horse drawn hearse and a nicer coffin.

It may seem frivolous but it means something to us. She died on Christmas Day from covid, alone aside from the nurses who held her hands. We’ve been told so many ‘no’s’ since she went into hospital for obvious and understandable reasons and we have all been traumatised by it. We wanted one bloody big yes and she loved taking us on horse and carriage rides so - she’s having this yes. Mum would be happy with it too if she was here. We could have done it within £4K if it wasn’t for that.

My Dad's last year was £4.3k. £3k to undertakers inc hearse, limo and coffin as well as collecting Dad from hospice, looking after him for 2 weeks and services on the day of funeral, crematorium fee £650, extra limo £250, minister's fee £230, doctors fee £82, stationery £95, webcast £36. I agree with @Baconking that the undertakers do a lot for their fee.

I have no idea why it's so expensive. My nans was over £4K and we cldnt have many at the meal after think it was 20 due to COVID. It was a burial but the plot was already owned and still need to get headstone which is about another £2K.

For my own funeral I am contemplating buying one of these: coffincompany.co.uk/wicker-coffins and storing it until the day arrives. Then I just want to be taken straight to the crematorium, no servi8ce, fuss or bother.