Do you know all of your families funeral wishes? Do they know yours? This episode looks into the ways that you can ensure your funeral wants and needs are carried out when the time comes. It discusses the process involved, the financial elements to a Pre-Paid Funeral Plan as well as the benefits to both you and your loved ones. Listen now if you want to ensure that there is no uncertainty about your final wishes.
Do you know all of your families funeral wishes? Do they know yours? This episode looks into the ways that you can ensure your funeral wants and needs are carried out when the time comes. It discusses the process involved, the financial elements to a Pre-Paid Funeral Plan as well as the benefits to both you and your loved ones. Listen now if you want to ensure that there is no uncertainty about your final wishes.
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 are well aware there's lots and lots of different myths, misconceptions and and taboos around the funeral profession. So we've decided to put this series of podcasts together to try and answer some of those questions and dispel some of those myths. Please, if you do have any questions, like, share and subscribe and pop those questions 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, we're going to be talking about Pre-Paid Funeral Plans. And I'm joined by my colleague, Amy. So, Amy, hello, how are you? Well, thank you. Officially in the hot seat. Absolutely. We got you eventually. Absolutely brilliant. Amy, just tell us a little bit about yourself, a bit of an introduction. So I've been with G Seller since 2014 and I started out in the masonry department then since progressing into the Pre-Paid Funeral side of things, alongside doing business development, marketing, HR, health and safety, podcasts, absolutely do a bit of everything. But Pre-Paid Funeral Plans is an area that we're really passionate about and I've got a great team that work alongside me. Absolutely. So, Pre-Paid Funeral Plans, what is a Pre-Paid Funeral Plan? Of course, so it's a safe and secure way of planning ahead, essentially, and ensuring that there's no uncertainty about your final wishes. As it stands at the moment, less than 1% of families know all of their loved ones final wishes. I mean, I know that I definitely don't know some of my family members final wishes. And that could be... that's even down to cremation or burial. It's quite surprising, isn't it? Because I'm in the exact same boat. Yeah, it's crazy. And I think if you're in a position to be able to talk about it or want to talk about it or explore it, then we've both seen, haven't we, at the time of need, those families that have had a funeral plan. And some of those details have been noted down, the relief on the family's face, where they go, I didn't know that. Absolutely. So much easier. We can spend a long, long time with a family during a funeral arrangement if we've got the basics, the basic structure of it makes it so much easier. And like you say, the family know they're getting the wishes of their loved one. Yeah, absolutely. And the way that we do funeral plans, we don't necessarily say, you've got to go with option A, B or C or a bronze, silver, gold package. We do the Independent Way. So what that means is that you get a funeral plan that is befitting to your wants, your needs, your wishes, so you're only having the funeral that you require. There aren't elements in there that you don't need, aren't fit for purpose, so on and so forth. And we arrange them as if we were looking after you today. So by that I mean we can go into as much or as little detail as you feel comfortable with. Obviously, at time of need, the Funeral Director will take questions such as how would you like your hair to be, the music choices that we've got. Is there something specific you would like to be laid to rest in? And we take all of those details down and we can go into that detail should a loved one or a client feel comfortable in doing so. To a degree we are actually arranging that person's funeral without the date and time. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely, brilliant. So I was going to ask you what are the benefits, what's the point of doing this but I guess that's kind of been answered because there's not just the financial element which we'll come to in a moment but there is that peace of mind, isn't there? Yeah, there is. So the way that we do funeral plans because they're itemised and they're bespoke to said person, the invoices are split into two parts. So people may have heard of our professional services and they're all guaranteed at today's price. So they consist of the coffin you wish to be laid to rest in, conveyance into our care, preparation and presentation of deceased. Those elements are guaranteed at today's cost. So irrelevant of if we have a price increase, they're guaranteed. And then people may have heard of elements such as third party costs or the word disbursements that often crops up. And they're costs that as Funeral Directors we have no control of. So they are things such as orders of service, catering minister, flowers, all of the crematorium. Yeah crematorium. And crematorium is the big one where costs can creep up. So we have no control of those. So by putting your money into the trust and accruing interest anywhere between 1% and 6% depending on market condition allows to offset any of those potential rising costs. So at the time of need there's very little for a family to pay and in some instances there's nothing to pay, it just depends on the amount of interest accrued and the time of taking out the funeral plan. So I think there's quite a unique point with G Seller here that if the funeral plan grows above we actually refund, don't we? Yeah, we do. And we still keep flexibility within the plan. So if people are taking out a plan, and today, in today's moment, they require three limousines, because we've got a big family, we're planning ahead for all the grandchildren and so on and so forth. But actually, at time of need, circumstances have changed. Family living away. Some people may not be able to come, so on and so forth. Those limousines can be taken off the bill, so that money is refunded back to the family, or the money is offset against something else. We would like a little bit more catering. We would like more flowers, orders of service. That money can be reallocated within the plan at the time of need, so it's still fit for purpose for that loved one and for the family saying goodbye. Absolutely. Really difficult question because I guess the sky is the limit, really. But how much does a plan cost? Yeah, so we say it's Your Funeral, Your Way. So it can be as simple as the term that people may have heard as a direct cremation. So your funeral can be as simple as that. As so we can have a simple direct cremation? Absolutely. And then all the way through to something extravagant, bespoke, somebody who loved a party. We're out at venues decorating them, we can do the whole hog and it's just keeping people open minded to that. And sometimes it's nice to have the conversation prior because, like I said, not everyone knows, everyone's wishes. Absolutely. Are there any set fees in there at all? Set fees? There's a one off administration that goes to Golden Charter. So we work in association with Golden Charter and they're a trust fund and they sit completely separate to us as Funeral Directors. So that one off fee is for them to look after your money in a safe, secure and ethical way and to ensure that your money is doing what we need it to do. We need it to grow, we need it to accrue that interest so the family, at the time of need don't have a large shortfall of money to pay for. It's not a reoccurring fee. Once it's paid and the money is in the trust fund, it's there, it's safe, it's secure, and Golden Charter will keep you up to date and write to you and let you know how your funeral plan is doing. Oh, brilliant. Okay, so an update about how it's growing, I guess. Yeah, absolutely. Brilliant. So can anyone put together a funeral plan? Yeah, they can. They can indeed. So it's not like certain insurance policies or so on and so forth, depending on health and what have you, so you can it doesn't matter what the state of health is, it's not means tested. It's a case of if you want a funeral plan for yourself or you want to take one out for somebody else for financial benefit and you're trying to sort out finances and you feel like money is better suited in a certain area, such as later life planning, then yes, anyone can take out a funeral plan. What about age range? Age range, okay. So again, anyone can. The only point where age comes into it is depending on the payment methods. So if it's the instalment option, which is where somebody may pay for a funeral plan over a period of time, that's when a funeral plan has to be paid on or before your 80th birthday. But other than that, you can be any age to take it out. But payment has to be payment in full or the twelve monthly payment option. So I can see you got some brochures there. Yeah, here's one. Is a funeral plan the only option? Are there anything else we can do here? So I spoke about having that, you know, that foresight, a family with some information makes it so much easier to arrange that funeral but there may be difficulties in financing. So are there any other options that we can provide? Yeah, so we put together a Funeral Wishes booklet and it allows people to fill this out in the comfort of their own home, at their own pace, having conversations with family members, so on and so forth and there are questions in here and things to think about as we've discussed. What coffin would you like to be laid to rest in? If you are cremated, would you like to be scattered? Where is that location? All the things are in here so people can start having those thoughts, that information can stay with the family and the family can then provide us with that or their Funeral Director at the time of need. Or the information can come back to us and we can keep it on file, free of charge service. If they wanted us to sit down and go through it and type up that so they feel like they've had that conversation absolutely. We do not charge for our time or that service, but again, it takes away any uncertainty and that's what's key about this so it's not necessarily about the money but it's about planning ahead and feeling comfortable that your family know your wishes. Exactly. And I think that point there about your family knowing your wishes it's important to tell people that you've taken a plan out or taken some wishes out because I can put money on there being a lot of plans in place that no one knows about. Yes, which is a whole other topic. But we won't get into that. Amy, thank you very much again. I'm sure that's a very brief overview of pre-paid planning. Any questions, please do like, share and subscribe and send those questions to liftingthelid@gseller.co.uk and we'll see you next time.