Practicalities after the death of a parent - timeframe and workload

[Yika]

Hi, my father died today (not completely unexpected and at a ripe old age).

Me and my 2 siblings will do the paperwork and organise the funeral.

My question (sorry if it sounds a bit coldhearted, I need to be practical!) is how much time off work do I need and how long do things take? I ask because I am a single parent to a young child and I live abroad (in Northern Europe, and my father and family are in southern England so within reach). I want to get to England to help my two siblings with all the arrangements but I also want to leave my child here so as not to pull her out of school for the duration (though of course I will bring her over for the funeral), so it will take a bit of organising. Also, I want to know how much time off work I should plan for. I have a flexible workplace (can take as much time as I need) and at the same time I also feel emotionally OK to work - it's more the practical side I need advice on!

1st issue is that the death has been reported to the coroner (I think because my father had not seen a doctor in recent days and was found collapsed at home / died shortly after being taken to a&e by an ambulance?). How long can we expect the report to take?

2nd issue is paperwork - what, how much, do I need to be there in person, is there a lot of visiting different services etc.

3rd issue is funeral - funeral will be very small (very few family and friends) - how long does it take to organise, do I need to be in situ to see the undertaker etc or can any of it be done from a distance? What's the normal timeframe until a funeral?

4th issue is probably more manageable and that is house clearance, personal paperwork etc - we can manage this over weekends etc.

Many thanks in advance for your advice and experience.

TBH it's more the house clearance that will really take time. COVID means that most death-related admin can be done remotely.
So assuming you are OK to call the UK from where you are, you can do a lot without travelling.

I took about a week off in total when Mum died iirc but that was 2 years ago and so things like registering the death, showing ID to the solicitors so I could pick up Mum's will, talking to the undertaker, briefing the humanist celebrant, were all done in person.

I downloaded a lists/Todo app and made a lot of lists - a top-level one would be things like, funeral, memorial, will, headstone, register death, and then each thing would have its own list or list, so "will" expanded out into dealing with all the accounts, getting probate, land registry, selling the car etc. Some of the accounts required me to turn up in person, show ID and documents and sign stuff, which was time-consuming, but others did it all by phone /email and surely by now it will all be remote.

Mum's partner still lives in her house (the will specifically arranged this) so we haven't cleared much of her stuff... will have to do it eventually and not looking forward to it.

Time-frames for funeral, postmortem (?), coroners etc will vary locally. But even before COVID I did very well to have Mum buried within the week, and that was because we didn't have a service then, we had a separate memorial event. You'll not be needing to rush, I think.

Great advice, many thanks!

This maybe helpful for you www.gov.uk/when-someone-dies

Sorry for your loss. When my MIL died pre-Covid, there had to be a post-mortem as she hadn’t been seen by the doctor within the required time period. Once that was complete (no suspicious circumstances) and her body released, we could plan the funeral. From memory, from death to funeral took around three weeks, maybe a little less.

DH did some work in between her death and the funeral but it’s personal and depends on how you feel.

MIL lived at a distance from us - we went down immediately (partly to make arrangements for her cat), then again to register the death and plan the funeral, and then for the funeral itself. We did most of the house clearance post-funeral and it took ages (she was a borderline hoarder).

Sorry for your loss. Lead time to funeral will depend on the area’s demands and the sort of funeral you want. My uncle died mid-October and the funeral is not until next week, so over a month which surprised me. But he wanted a burial which I think may make the time longer than perhaps a crematorium booking.

You should be able to do most of the admin remotely if you have the contact details for all of the relevant institutions.

You could maybe deal with the house clearance in the school holidays? Remember there is no rush to deal with most things.

Best of luck with it all.

I'm so sorry for your loss. Both of my parents died last year, and MIL died last week, so alas I have lots of experience in this.

1. The coroner was involved for my dad and MIL. With dad, they decided along with his GP that there was plenty of reasons for him to have died naturally, so only took them a day to release him and the GP issued the death certificate. With MIL it is a bit different as though they know what she died of, it is a reportable cause which needs an inquest. But it was 4 days for them to decide on no PM, and they issued an interim certificate which will allow the funeral to go ahead. They said the inquest will be in a few weeks, but not too long as it is straightforward.
2. For mum and dad I did everything by post and phone, no visits anywhere needed. But there is a lot of sending things off, so ask for at least 5 copies of the death certificate so you aren't waiting for each lot to send them back. You'll need his NI number, NHS number, birth cert and marriage cert, passport and driving license as well.
3. You can do everything with the funeral director remotely if you wish. Timescales depend on how busy the nearest crematorium is, how long a time slot you want, but the FD will know.
4. I cleared my parents house with 4 visits and then a house clearance company. I got a storage unit so I could bring everything back to me that would need sorting through then my brother had the option to take what he wanted. It made it much more manageable, and for me at a distance (and my brother even further) it just needed to be done efficiently.

This is incredibly helpful, thank you so much for taking the time to share links and experiences.

My dad died suddenly 2 weeks ago today. We got the post mortem results on Friday and seeing funeral director later this week - they’ve told us funeral likely in the week starting 13 December even though we only want simple cremation.

Everything else is turning out to be an absolute nightmare for us as he was a huge hoarder who had let the house become practically uninhabitable and my mum is still living there. But hopefully that won’t be the case for you.