FUNERAL PRICE TRANSPARENCY

Americans are not the only people in the world who have a difficult time finding accurate funeral price information. Australians have the same problem.

One of the many small estate planning things people can do to make things easier on their families is to plan ahead for their own funerals.  By making all of the arrangements they want for their funerals and paying for everything in advance, people give their estates one less thing to worry about.

At least, that is how it is supposed to work.

In reality, people have often found it difficult to get funeral pricing information so they can find the best deal.  Even when they do sign contracts and pay in advance, many families are later hit with hefty bills for things they thought were included in the funeral price but were not.

This is not just a problem in the U.S.

In fact, Australia has the same issue as The Guardian reports in "Funeral pricing comparison website targeted with legal threats."

A former solicitor in Australia went undercover and posed as a customer at funeral homes.  He got pricing information from over 600 of them. He posted the information on a website so other Australians could easily comparison shop and make sure they were not being quoted a price from a funeral home that was more expensive than another customer was quoted from the same business.

He is now being threatened with legal action.

In the U.S., funeral homes are legally required to give customers fair and accurate pricing information, when requested.  However, it has proven very difficult to enforce those laws.

Anyone who has problems getting the information should not hesitate to call an estate attorney.

Reference: The Guardian (May 29, 2017) "Funeral pricing comparison website targeted with legal threats."