When making arrangements for my father the funeral director told us that an oversize casket would be required. He justified the need for this at a $3,000 upcharge by saying that my father's elbow to elbow width exceeded that for which a standard casket was designed. My father was 5'10" and 180-190# pretty average size for an adult male, I cannot see where a standard casket would not have worked. I feel that this was a rip off, has anyone ever heard of this kind of thing?
Sounds like he needed to be looking for a casket.
Doesn't Costco sell caskets?
It's a racket. So bad, the Feds have gotten involved several times.
Yes, Costco sells caskets, so does Walmart. For a lot less than your local funerary rip off artist. A good friend of mine is one of the last independent funeral directors, and one of the good guys, but most of the industry stinks to high heaven.
We would have been going somewhere else.
I've heard lots of stories about the "used car salesmanship" techniques of funeral homes who take advantage of grieving families by making them feel guilty if they don't cough p the money on their dearly departed.
When my father died in 1965, he was 6'4" tall and weighed about 220 pounds. His casket was a standard casket. Maybe today the caskets are all made in China just to fit Chinamen. Therefore anyone larger than an average Chinaman would need an "extra large" casket.
You think?
L.W.
I am sure if I was not about half drunk I would not be thinking about whether or not there was a Ralph's nearby?
You got ripped off. I work in this area part time.
Bigger casket, bigger hole?? Surprised he didn't try to sell you two plots also.
Ask his slimy ass if the extra room was to add his body to it after the local hitman got done
Would have a lot of hard questions to answer if I was asking them.
POST the TURD ball funeral homes name on here for others to AVOID..
Local funeral home owner and mortician (now deceased himself) also built and owned a local nursing home. Over the years he wound up owning quite a bit of real estate and physical property, a good deal of it from former customers, signed over as payment for services rendered.
Local funeral home owner and mortician (now deceased himself) also built and owned a local nursing home. Over the years he wound up owning quite a bit of real estate and physical property, a good deal of it from former customers, signed over as payment for services rendered.
There was a local lawyer who did that.
Local funeral home owner and mortician (now deceased himself) also built and owned a local nursing home. Over the years he wound up owning quite a bit of real estate and physical property, a good deal of it from former customers, signed over as payment for services rendered.
There was a local lawyer who did that.
And bankers...
When making arrangements for my father the funeral director told us that an oversize casket would be required. He justified the need for this at a $3,000 upcharge by saying that my father's elbow to elbow width exceeded that for which a standard casket was designed. My father was 5'10" and 180-190# pretty average size for an adult male, I cannot see where a standard casket would not have worked. I feel that this was a rip off, has anyone ever heard of this kind of thing?
I buried my dad earlier this year, he stood an even 6' and weighed about 215. He did not require a specialized casket.
Guessing you already purchased?
Put that in your local paper. I would have been measuring the casket if they told me some cshit like that.
my younger brother passed away in 1970 at 16....
not long ago, I came up with the receipt for the funeral arrangements...
Transported from Metro Wash DC, to Southern WVa to be buried next to our grandfather...
Casket and then lying in for viewing for 3 days, and then transported to Comer's Cemetery
with the grave dug, a minister for the Eulogy, and burial....
1970... $255.00....
guess that is where they get that figure for governmental burial assistance under Medicare...
I have no desire to be buried... I will be cremated... no worries about a coffin...
I don't want some hole in the ground to be my final resting place.. period..
That whole industry is out of control and the experience is exactly like buying a car now, hold onto your wallet. Don't think because you are being cremated they aren't going to try and rip you off. They have an overpriced upsell for every situation. If you can take care of it yourself it is much easier on your loved ones. These people make their money by preying on grieving loved ones. 99% scumbags.
When my dad died the funeral home told me & my mom that if we wanted a public funeral service embalming was required by law.
The state of North Carolina has NO embalming law.
Mike
They can sure be scumbags.
This is one of the worst.
Son Says Mom's Ashes Dug Up
The Associated Press
CARLSBAD— The operator of a Carlsbad cemetery has been accused of digging up a woman's cremated remains during a dispute with her family over payment for her burial.
Bill Crouch, who owns Sunset Gardens Memorial Cemetery with his wife, Gladys, bonded out of jail after his arrest Wednesday on charges of disturbing marked burial grounds.
The Associated Press left a telephone message Friday at Sunset Gardens seeking comment from Bill Crouch, but the call was not immediately returned. No listing could be found in the Carlsbad area for Crouch.
The Crouches were the target of a two-day administrative hearing last month by the state Thanatopractice Board on allegations of abuse, neglect, fraud and unprofessional business practices. The board regulates cemeteries.
Aubrey Lewis told board members that his mother was disinterred for alleged nonpayment.
"I don't know when or who dug up my mother's grave," Lewis said. "The grave was an open pit. It had been that way for almost a week.
"You could still see the ridge where the casket had been," he said, referring to the small box that contained the cremated remains. "There was dirt scattered everywhere. I felt I was going to throw up. We just wanted to get Mom back next to Dad."
Lewis said Gladys Crouch told him after his mother died in April 2003 that there would be a $200 charge for opening and closing the gravesite beside his father. He said Bill Crouch told him the amount had to be paid before the funeral.
He said he and his sister tried unsuccessfully to reach the Crouches for days before the funeral and finally left a check in Crouch's office the day of the service.
A few days later, Bill Crouch told Lewis he knew nothing about the check, and the brother and sister later decided to cancel payment on it.
A week later, they discovered that their mother's remains had been removed.
State hearing officer Willard H. Davis Jr. submitted a 17-page report on Sunset Gardens.
I had the unfortunate displeasure of having to deal with the funeral director on other deals. The guy needed killin' as bad as anyone I ever met.
Not only had he dug up that woman's grave, but he sexually abused many boys, and was suspected in the deaths of two teen girls in a murder case that never produced enough evidence to go to trial.
Most of them that I've met talk real low, almost in a whisper. I don't trust people who talk like that.
They figure they have you over the barrel. What are most people going to do? take their family remains and go elsewhere?
my father's elbow to elbow width exceeded that for which a standard casket was designed.
I'd of told him not to measure with dads hands on his hips.
The funeral director is a crooked ass.
My experience with these guys has been that they are the lowest of the low, creepy, greedy scumbags whose only concern is how much money they can squeeze out of the bereaved while they are at their most vulnerable. I dont think even used car salesmen are as unscrupulous.
I've put quite a few guys bigger in standard caskets. This is what you know it is. Undertakers are like anyone else, some crooks, some not. The way to deal with this is to go get your arrangements in advance, just the way you want them.
At a time of grief most of us are easy marks. I think the whole industry is corrupt. My brother in law died in august and his wife had him cremated. It cost less but not by much. I think around here you have to pay for embalming whether you are buried or cremated.
Some states allow you to build your own casket, some don't. Those that don't were heavily lobbied by morticians to protect their casket market. They claimed that their's were 'better'. Some years ago, I saw a video of a funeral using one of those 'better' ones. As the pall bearers were carrying the casket down the church steps, the bottom fell out, dumping the body on the steps. Any home woodworker with less than 3 thumbs can do better than that.
Often you need either a steel casket or a concrete vault. That has nothing to do with preserving the body. It's a rule in many cemeteries. As a wood casket deteriorates, it collapses leaving a divot in the ground. The cemeteries don't want to have to go back and fill the holes so they require something that won't collapse. If you build your own wood one, they'll require the vault.
Another mortician game is embalming. In most states, it's not required except in the case of a few highly contagious diseases. All it does it preserve the body longer to give out of town relatives more time to get there for the funeral. Morticians make a bundle selling it like it's required. I have a walk-in cooler that will work just as well. It'll hold an elk for 2 weeks or more.
Avoid all this crap and expense. Cremate.
No thanks, I'll be cremated. My son can spread my ashes over our favorite hunting spot.
$950.00 to be cremated.Includes Urn and a room for some type of service.Who wants to be stuck in the ground as worm food?
My Father in Law died several years ago. He had a $10,000 funeral expense policy. His desire was to be cremated.
There was a viewing and a funeral for him, however. The actual coffin was a simple pine box that he was to be cremated in. But for the viewing, they had the pine coffin placed inside a nice casket that was set up for such. You couldn't see the pine box in it. They placed fabric around the edges and it looked fairly typical. The bill for the funeral came to, lo and behold!,...$10,000. The itemized breakdown of the expenses showed $3000 for the use of the casket that his pine box rested in for the showing.
1000 dollars a day to rent a casket.
Yeah,...there's some serious rip offs going on in the funeral industry.
I'd have demanded that I be allowed to get into a standard casket myself and "try it on for size".
Many funeral directors are con artists. I expect there is a hot place in hell for them.
My old daddy told me the three people who take advantage of others are :
Undertaker
Lawyers
Used car salesmen
They get you when you are at a low point in your life. Hasbeen
Doesn't Costco sell caskets?
Yes, but you have to buy a ten pack...
The local FH here tried to do the song and dance on my mom when Dad passed. I was late arriving for planning due to travel. I looked over the $$ and their services. I’m certain I was an ass but upon conclusion services were reduced by about 34%. We had a very matter of fact discussion in private away from my grieving Mom and sibs. I despise the SOB’s that are corporate FH’s.
Doesn't Costco sell caskets?
Yes, but you have to buy a ten pack...
The Clintons got a bulk rate for their associates.
I honestly wonder if sometimes funeral homes actually do give all the preparatory mortuary services in full that they are supposed to do and charge for.
How would anyone know if they cut a few corners to clear some extra profit like by not fully embalming or maybe not at all?
Years ago we had a mortician in our church. Another fellow retired in CA and moved here. He hired on with the mortician to supplement his pension. He had worked for Wonder Bread for 30+ years. The 1st time he got to help with an embalming, he looked at the label on the fluid and recognized it as the same stuff they put in Wonder Bread to prevent it from molding. If you eat enough Wonder Bread, you won't need embalming. You'll keep like Lenin.
Something else to consider...
I lost my 1st wife to cancer 12 years ago. Months before she died, I made most of the arrangements. She was a school teacher and one of her very active parents was a mortician. He said to come in to see him. He showed me a funeral insurance policy he had available. You had to have it in effect for 2 years to get the full benefits but they'd pay out 50% if the policy holder died before that. He put together an elaborate funeral package that cost twice what we would have paid and we took out a policy for that. When she died, we just cut it back to what the policy paid. We paid out 2 monthly premiums total.
While that might sound a bit shady, they did offer the policy of their own free will and we followed their terms to the letter.
Not a bad deal for the funeral home if the markup is 80%.......
Our oldest daughter was good friends in high school with the daughters of a family owned funeral home owner/mortician in a nearby town. The family lived in the same big building above the funeral home. Daughter went to a couple of slumber parties at their house and said those kids thought nothing of walking around among dead bodies regardless day or night. She said it was a real hoot watching their kids get all wound up excited when dad got a couple funerals to run at the same time --- Yay, ... we can go shopping big time now!
Some of y'all are painting with a broad brush, kind of like our liberal friends that claim bad guys with guns means that anyone with a gun is bad. There are unscrupulous individuals in all walks of life and it is a mature person that learns to deal with it and not get sucked in. I've known many funeral directors and never known any of them to inter someone with the shoes on the wrong feet, zipper down or even face down. Although some probably deserved it. I have known them to help a family take care of a loved one at all hours of the night, deal with loved ones that have been dead for a while, and have multiple funeral services on holidays when they would love to be with their families. Sorry you ran into a bad one, I ran into a bad mechanic not long ago.
Never buried anyone face down. That is interesting.
My Dad went in to the undertaker thirty years ago and purchased his entire package and wrote out specific instructions. Including," I have always slept on my stomach, and I will spend eternity on my stomach".
I had a friend who was a clown and when he died, all his friends went to the funeral in one car.
I built a really nice new funeral home for a long time established funeral home in a large city. It took awhile. Got to know mortican and adminnistrator well. I learned too many secrets and tricks to reveal here or believe.. I learned one that haunts to this day,I wish I hadn't. The head mortican told me they had an extremely hard time hiring people who won't have sex with the dead people. You can't make that up. Life is so much better if we could stay naive.
My wife and I recently purchased a pre-need package and dealt with all of the grossly over priced options. Things like a cardboard box for transport and cremation at the low, low price of only $175. For cardboard! I said I'd leave the kids enough to buy a new refrigerator and they can use the box it comes in. FH can't allow that he says.
Then they tried to sell us a "policy" that would pay to ship the body back to where we are currently living. I said, This FH is a national chain correct? So. if I croak somewhere else just use the nearest facility. And if that wont work my SIL has a pickup truck.
After an afternoon with those guys I have a new found respect for used car salesmen!
Mother & father in law were killed in a car wreck twenty years ago. They had pre-paid funeral policies that I found. Got to the funeral home and we were told the policies were no longer valid. They had "cashed them in" for the face value several years earlier and bought two small life insurance policies. Never could prove anything, but suspect that the funeral home people had a cohort insurance agent and when these policies reached maturity and the cost of the funeral was greater than the policy they would talk the policy holder into cashing the policy for the $3,500 face value and paying a monthly premium for an insurance policy of the same value. So, the funeral home isn't "stuck" with eating the cost above the pre-paid policy. The in-laws were mid eighties when killed, so it appears these people were preying on the older folks.
The funeral director also tried the upselling on everything. Even to the point of trying to sell us caskets with the equivalent of refrigerator gaskets that would supposedly keep the bodies from deteriorating for fifty years. Ended up handing the guy the no-longer-in-effect funeral policies and telling him we wanted exactly what was on the policies. Period.
I knew there was no way we could get through this thread without necrophilia being mentioned.
When my father-in-law passed, a local mortician (and long-time acquaintance) called asking about the funeral arrangements.
He got huffy with "The Warden" when she didn't fall into hauling her dad 125 miles for the meager sum of $1200.
She and her Mom hauled Elmer to Albuquerque in the back of an SUV.
Joy said it was not only quiet, but he didn't even tell her where to turn!
My wife's brother has a backhoe. Good enough for me.
Some states, like Idaho, are pretty lenient on how you can handle a body. Here, you can do your own death certificate, requiring only the signature of the doctor, nurse, PA, etc. The forms are all online at the state health dept website. You can move the body yourself within the state. If you cross a state line, it's more complicated depending on the other state's laws. You can bury the person at home, have a home funeral, etc. all without a funeral home being involved. No embalming is required as long as you don't use public transportation to move the body.
Some towns restrict burials so you have to check local laws and zoning.
The death cert. certifies that the state knows the person is dead and they know how he died. Beyond that, it's whatever you want to do.
My brother operated a backhoe for a number of years and got called to dig up an individual that was being exhumed (for what reason I do not remember), long story short they were buried in a vault and when he removed the cover the casket apparently did not fit ,was too big for the vault. It had obviously been jammed into the vault with a backhoe bucket crushed like a tin can. To say the least the family was quite perturbed....
They know most folks are emotional, feel guilty about being “cheap”, and are on a tight time schedule when this happens. What a racket...
Funerals and weddings are out of reason any more. $20 to 30g isn't uncommon for weddings and funerals can get about as bad if the family is too emotional. Thing is, most people at a funeral are there to remember the deceased. They don't even notice the 'quality' of the box, the number of flowers, etc.
The funeral business is FRAUGHT with corruption and they get away with it, preying on families at their most vulnerable . Example: 125 dollars for a Guest Signing book, when one can get the exact same book for 4.99 anywhere.
The list is endless.
Burying your own is a good way to say goodbye.
Almost every part of a funeral can be done yourself without a FH being involved. You have a computer and printer? Print your own programs and cards. Buy your own guest book. Buy a casket online or at Costco. Need a Hearse? Rent a Suburban or a van. Anyone in the family can drive it so you don't need to pay a driver. Costco has the best price on flowers you'll find anywhere and there must be someone in the family adept at arranging them.
My brother died unexpectedly of a stroke 8 years ago. He was single so we stepped in and did it all. We had him cremated and that was the only thing we paid to have done. We held the funeral in his house with chairs I rented. He had a friend who was a minister so we got him for the service. It wasn't that hard and everyone seemed to think it was nice. We could have spent $5k and have nothing to show for it.
That, or Colorado still permits funeral pyre's, or so I hear.....
With the urban legend and ghoul stuff ya hear about em.
What I'm about to say kinda applies I think.
And is not the individuals fault but his relatives.
And I know employing the mentally handicapped is a good thing.
I mean look their are a bunch of people on here who are successful and it has worked out for them.
JK.
Local well known funeral home here in clarksville on Madison street
You walk into the entrance way/ greeting area where all the old ghouls who work their wait to snag a customer and commission....
All dressed extremely nice
3 piece burying suits basically..
So here goes...
Always and i mean always
Their is a 35-40 yr old relative with Downes syndrome that "works" their.
Doesn't say a word...
Just sits their looking off into space..
It's kinda unnerving to see for one of the 1st people you see in a funeral home under less than a great situation to begin with for going into the place.
It leaves a very strange impression.
Just saying....
You may not wanna know what his real job is.
Had an experience with my wife's dad's funeral that was a bit unsettling. Her dad had all his funeral arrangements pre-planned and paid for.
He was to have an initial funeral service here where they had lived for a good number of years and then transported to his hometown in east central Indiana with a small grave side service and burial in the cemetery where other family members of his are buried. The trip was around 200 - 250 miles one way.
Wife, son and myself were driving in our car and about 2/3 rds of the way there a hearse from the funeral home her dad was at in KY went flying past us on the highway. My wife let out a horrified gasp, with, "That's my daddy"! He was supposed to have already been there well ahead of family and had everything set up for the grave side service.
As it turned out the hearse carrying her dad still got there around a half hour later than we did, family members and close friends, most of which were elderly, standing around sweating in the sun waiting,
Seems like all too often when payment in full is made up front you get what little they feel they can get away with once they have your money in their hands.
My parents moved to Boise shortly after WWII. About 15 years ago, they did a prepaid funeral arrangement thing. Dad died in '06 and all went well. Now Mom is over 100 and lives with my sister near Seattle. It's a national chain and this last summer they contacted them to verify that all's well. It is. The policy is transferable and they have complete records of it all and what will be paid. Originally she wanted to have her funeral in Boise but now she has not a single friend or acquaintance in Boise. She's just outlived them all. She has new friends where she is now so her funeral will be there. She'll be cremated and the family will take her ashes to Boise to bury next to Dad's.
I have a nephew who's a potter. He's made urns for a number of family members. Mom wanted to see hers so he made her a beauty. She keeps it around as a work of art, which it is. She's not a bit morbid about it.
If you just got ripped off for some $$, be thankful, it could be much worse. I'm currently involved with this horrific situation.
https://www.denverpost.com/2018/11/10/montose-sunset-mesa-funeral-home-body-parts/
Sounds like he needed to be looking for a casket.
Yep I’d have been tempted to stuff his azz in one and say f it you fit, if daddy don’t chop him up a bit.
Not all mind you but some funeral directors are fing vultures. Using a family’s grief and weak point to harvest more of their dollars.
I’m over that chit, cremated and no services for me thanks. Elbow to elbow my azz I’ll fit in a good coffee can not one of those stupid urns.
Everybody thinkin they have to bury their loved ones like King Tut! F that
Can't read it without disabling my ad blocker which I won't do. What does it say?
Can't read it without disabling my ad blocker which I won't do. What does it say?
It says that a funeral home was selling body parts and pulling gold teeth to sell as well.
My uncle Owen, great guy btw
Always said our local funeral home operator was biggest hypocrite in town. Pushing a 6k casket down the aisle while trying to look sad