10. How To Handle Family Conflict When Planning A Funeral
Jan 20, 2023Episode 10
G Seller and Co - Andy Eeley & Joe Clarke-Ferridge
Family conflict over funeral arrangements is up by almost 60% according to The National Association of Funeral Directors, after speaking with their members which total over 4000 funeral homes.
These disputes can resurface following historical rifts, or be caused by uncertainty in their loved ones wishes.
This episode looks into the many reasons why family conflicts can arise when planning a funeral for your loved one, as well as ways to refocus, resolve and reach that common goal.
The National Association of Funeral Directors - www.nafd.org.uk
Family conflict over funeral arrangements is up by almost 60% according to The National Association of Funeral Directors, after speaking with their members which total over 4000 funeral homes.
These disputes can resurface following historical rifts, or be caused by uncertainty in their loved ones wishes.
This episode looks into the many reasons why family conflicts can arise when planning a funeral for your loved one, as well as ways to refocus, resolve and reach that common goal.
The National Association of Funeral Directors - www.nafd.org.uk
Hi. My name is Andy Eeley. I'm a Senior Funeral Director with G Seller Independent Funeral Directors and we've been serving bereaved families since 1910. I'm sure you're well aware there's lots and lots of different myths, misconceptions and taboos around what happens within the Funeral Profession. So we've decided to put this series of podcasts together to try and dispel some of those myths and of course answer any questions that you may have. So please do like, share and subscribe and send those questions, send them to liftingthelid@gseller.co.uk and we will do our best to answer them for you. It genuinely is Our Family Caring For Your Family. Today is a topic, I'm with my co-host Joe, we're talking families, we're talking families in conflict, which is quite prevalent, isn't it? I think there's a relatively recent survey by the National Association of Funeral Directors and they state that amongst 4000 funeral homes, nearly two thirds, that's 57%, they've had conflict to deal with, which is actually quite a big number. So we get it more and more, don't we? Sort of people come in and there's some sort of conflict in the family for whatever reason, and it can be slightly detrimental to arranging a funeral. Certainly can make things a bit tricky. Absolutely. We're kind of becoming mediators in some way, aren't we, really? Yeah, because we sort of have a general rule that will only take instruction from a single person when we're going through funeral arrangements, for the simple reason that of course, if we're taking lots of instructions for lots of different people, it's going to affect how that funeral comes together. Not always for the better of the final outcome of the funeral. No, you can vote, too many cooks spoil the broth, I guess is the sort of, a bit of a connection there. But, in respect to those funeral arrangements, this challenge that we have, sometimes these could be split families, it could be families that have been perhaps even forced together to put those funeral arrangements together. So it's something that there may have been a historical rift that we kind of have to bridge that gap to come to a means to an end really, to put this funeral together. Such a difficult thing to do. I mean, there's a lot of uncertainty over the deceased's wishes as well. Are they getting it right? And that can cause a lot of conflict. You might have one family member with their opinion, another with their opinion. Yeah. And of course, the funeral quite often brings people together in such a way they might not have spoken together for a long time, as you said, but all of a sudden they're forced into a single room with someone like yourself or me and face all these questions that all of a sudden they've got to have some sort of compromise on. Whereas before they've not been able to compromise about much at all. One of these questions could be, how is it paid for? Who's paying? Where's the money coming from? Huge things to consider for a family that aren't particularly getting on well together. So how do we deal with it, Joe? We sit there, we're in a room, we're faced with this family. You've already mentioned that we tend to take instruction from one individual, but sometimes things can escalate, things can boil over. I've had people storm out of an arranging room before go and have five minutes, going perhaps to go outside for a minute, or they've even gone to another room and I've gone to deal with them separately, to have a bit of a chat to them and just try and refocus that there's a common goal here. Even if you don't necessarily get along with the people that are in front of you. You know that person as long as the people are in that room, they're there to look after the person that's passed away, as we are. And that is the common goal. And actually, you tend to find, or I've found, that when people are starting to focus on that, then things start coming together a little bit easier. Absolutely. I mean, some of these responses, they could be something so simple, it could be a choice of music. We quite often hear that, I've heard the phrase "someone's going to kick off" at the funeral service so many times, and to be fair, we've had in the crematorium, it can only be described as a really frosty divide. So I've had one half of the family seated on one side of the crematorium, the other half of the family seated on the other. And to be fair, most of it is a common goal, isn't it? We're there to look after the wishes of the deceased. Most people would adhere to that. You tend to find that despite people saying they're worried that someone is going to 'kick off', as you said, the funeral service, nine and a half times out of ten, people are more respectful than that. Very rarely have I ever had it where someone has shouted or done anything at a funeral service. Normally you sit there, you get through the service. When you leave, you might never have to sit down with these people ever again. You can leave, but at least you've done what's right for your dad or your mum or your sister. However, whoever the person is that we're looking after, there's very rarely, ever any major conflict at a funeral that I've had to deal with. Yeah, I've been asked in the past if I could have a bouncer stood on the door to prevent an individual coming into the room. It might be worth noting that the crematorium, it's a public space, we can't really stop people coming in, can we? No. I've had situations before where if there's a particular person my client hasn't particularly wanted in, I've had conversations with them outside and just said, look, they've asked that you're not to go in there. I can't stop you from going in, but perhaps ask that you maybe just sit at a seat towards the back or so, or perhaps further away. Try not perhaps to interact with that particular part of the family and that's sort of how things will fall. But it can be, let's say, as you're going through funeral arrangements, it can be the smallest thing can't it, that perhaps, say, you said about music, but perhaps an order of service as well. How things are put together, what pictures are going on the front of the service sheet. Everything can be a little bit contentious if there is a bit of bad blood between people. So when you talk about communication within a normal environment, obviously someone sends a message to you, you receive the message and then sort of feed back and get it 100% confirmed. The situation within a funeral, we've got grief to deal with, we've got bereavement, we've got lots and lots of heightened emotions and that kind of amplifies everything. So it can be really quite difficult for us. We need to actively listen to what the family is saying and ensure that we are doing exactly what their wishes are. The slightest bit of miscommunication, it can have a huge effect. If you've got a family at rift, something so small could potentially erupt and not necessarily small, but especially regards to chapel of rest, someone wants to come to the chapel and then if someone puts a restriction on chapels so again, we take our instructions from a single person. Absolutely. So if that single person was to say to me, we want to restrict who can come to the chapel to come and spend some time with their loved one, then we've got a system in place that deals with that. So for ourselves, it's a business card. and that we'll sign a business card, we'll give certain amount of those business cards to the client, they'll distribute to people and then when people come into our chapel, they will pass us the signed business card. And that is how you gain access to go to our chapel of rest. Absolutely. But it's very strict, isn't it? Of course. I mean, I always say, please bear in mind, even to our client, that it's probably only myself that knows who that client is because somebody else in the business, you might not have seen the person who that is, if they haven't got their card, they won't be allowed to go to the chapel. Yeah. And we make them, really, that is a point we drive home, and make everyone incredibly aware that that's the case, just to try and avoid some of that conflict and that potential of something happening to ourselves as colleagues and the colleagues that we work with. And there's different say, I've had people saying they're going to go to the newspapers and all sorts, it rarely ever comes of anything fortunately. At the end of the day, if we're surmising things generally, by the time it gets to the funeral service, I think people aim towards a common goal. Yeah. I think the only occasion I've had a potential cancellation of a funeral service, there were two executives involved, and it was pointed out quite rightly that two executives, they have to meet in a common ground. And my response to them was that that's fine, but it's not really my position to mediate. If you can't come to some form of compromise, I will do exactly what you want me to do. But if you can't come to that compromise, then perhaps that's something for a court of law to decide. Let's get that resolution in place before you even come to us. Our perspective, really, we're looking after the wishes of your loved one, and that's our primary focus. Okay, brilliant. I think before we close, I think it's quite important to say that having a plan in place, letting your family know what your wishes are as an individual can kind of resolve this, a pre-paid plan, or even just jotting down the funeral wishes. It makes it much easier from our perspective as Funeral Directors. No arguments in the family. There's no arguments in the family. And the family absolutely are doing what their loved one wants, and it just makes it so much easier. I think that's quite important. Absolutely. Brilliant. Thank you, Joe. Thank you. Of course, as always, if there's any questions, any comments that you wish to make, please do like, share, subscribe, send those questions, send them to liftingthelid@gseller.co.uk and we will do our absolute best to answer them. And we'll see you next time. Thank you.