Well, I've cried and handled a lot of anger already this morning, and it's not even 11am yet.
I'd asked for mum's funeral director to call me this morning so I could find out what details I needed to finalise so we can get a final invoice, which we need to take into the bank and have it paid directly out of the estate.
I have no issues with the current funeral directors handling mum's funeral, they've been great. We finalised a few other details, there are a couple of things I need to confirm with other family members and make sure are done, then they can do a final invoice.
I also asked the previous funeral directors who handled dad's funeral, which my mum and brother hadn't finished paying off after dad's passing, because mum was severely unwell emotionally and physically by that point, and I've since found out would open her post, tuck it into a bag that she'd previously would have gone through and dealt with later, back in the days when she was super organised and on top of things - but with her short term memory problems, declining health due to cancer, and the grief of losing her life partner of 57 years, hadn't been handling. I had asked my brother to take charge of paying it off from their joint account, since he had been in charge of shopping and online ordering, and was the one opening post with mum, while I handled the medical and personal care stuff, which was overwhelming enough as it was. So I didn't worry about the financial stuff, knowing it could be figured out later, even if it was more hassle then.
Obviously, my brother didn't handle it, I shouldn't have trusted him too, and now it's much more complicated since mum has passed. Had either of us handled it while mum was alive, it could have easily been paid off from the money they had in their joint account. But now that she's passed, we obviously cannot touch any of the money in any of their accounts directly, it has to go through probate.
When mum passed, the hospice workers could see I was in shock and exhausted, and gently talked us through the next steps. Called the district nurses for us, so they could come out and confirm mum's passing, and that once that was done, to find a funeral company that could come and collect mum. They asked if we had a funeral home picked out or a plan, and we said no, then Sam mentioned that we hadn't yet finished paying off dad's funeral even. Bear in mind also that we hadn't even collected dad's ashes yet. We weren't dragging our heels not wanting to pay. It was a combination of being so busy looking after mum as her health took a serious downturn after losing dad, as did mine, to be fair, mentally at least - and not having someone competent to handle the financial side of things. I wanted to collect dad's ashes, but choosing an urn upset mum, and then I consciously decided to wait to collect them, since I knew seeing an urn with dad's ashes would have severely upset mum, and the funeral directors had assured us that there was no rush, it could wait until we'd found a suitable urn.
So once the initial shock had worn off, I called the funeral directors that had handled dad's funeral and cremation. Bearing in mind that mum passed on Christmas Day too. As it happened, the person who answered was the funeral director who had been in charge of dad's funeral, and spent more than an hour at our house, met mum, and remembered us, passed her condolences and assured me that they would look after mum. To just call her once the district nurses had been, and then they'd have people come within 90 minutes to take mum into their care. I mentioned then that I'd found out we hadn't even yet finished paying off dad's funeral, and she told me not to worry about that right now, it can all be sorted out, and that they'd take good care of mum.
When the guys arrived to collect mum, after I'd laid her out, alone - one of them assured me that they treat people as if it were their own family member.
So I figured okay, we still owe them money, but they know mum and dad owned their house outright, that they have some savings - not a huge amount, but easily enough to cover both funerals, and that we'd just pay them for both mum and dad's funerals, that we'd just be running up the bill of what we owe them, but that they know it's within parents estate for them to get paid.
But no. On the 27th, just two days after mum's passing, and you guys know I was still a wreck, having not been able to eat, sleep, and still a hypervigilant mess since mum had needed me so much in her final weeks especially both day and night. So I was still reeling, woken from a few hours of fitful sleep by the funeral home - a nervous sounding girl asking if I could come into the office to begin sorting out mum's funeral. I said I can't to the office yet, but that basically we wanted the same things we'd had for dad's funeral. Cremation, same crematorium, simple coffin, ideally the same minister if we could, but that I needed some time before I could come in, and also deal with agoraphobia so could we make most arrangements over the phone? She ended up getting off the phone and I was a bit surprised they'd called so soon, but didn't give it much other thought. I'd still only been half awake, for one thing.
Then a few hours later, they called again. But this time it was a really icy cold, obviously more senior and strict woman. She was ice cold, said that since there was still an outstanding balance on dad's funeral, they wouldn't be able to arrange mum's funeral. I was gobsmacked. Immediately both panicked, tearful and angry all at once. I asked what that meant, that they knew the money was in my parents accounts to cover both, but with them having both passed without wills, I couldn't touch it and had to find out about the probate process, that dad's funeral was the first time I'd even had to arrange a funeral, so what were we meant to do? She said we'd have to find another funeral company, but that they'd "take care of mum" until we found another company.
I said well we needed to pay a large down payment to them for dad's funeral (£1,500), that surely another funeral company would also want a deposit like that, that we didn't personally have that kind of money and couldn't touch mum and dad's accounts, and would another funeral company even be willing to take on mum's funeral if we still owed money to her company? Her answer? "Well, WE won't tell them!" That's a quote, BTW. I asked why Shelley, the director who had handled dad's funeral and who I spoke to on Christmas Day hadn't called, could I speak to her? She said no, that we wouldn't be able to speak to her. Personally, I thought that was cowardly, but didn't say that.
She didn't offer any solutions. Just ice cold saying they wouldn't do it. So through gritted teeth I asked how much time I had. How long they'd be willing to "look after" mum while I tried to find a solution. She said not to worry, they'd take care of mum until another company would come and collect her from them. I still have the notes I made during this conversation, too. She didn't give me a date for mum to be collected by, nothing, just said that they couldn't handle mum's funeral because of the outstanding balance, to find another funeral company, and that they'd take care of mum until another company took her into their care.
I've idled with the thought of making a complaint to that company, especially for the way I was spoken to only two days after mum's passing, but I'd told myself to wait on that. That I'm grief stricken, angry and hurt, and not to make a decision like that in the heat of the moment, and that there are more important things to worry about at this time. But it has remained in the back of my mind, because at the very least, it was unprofessional, utterly lacking in empathy, and cost their company around five grand in business they would have otherwise been assured of.
These phone calls and me having to be the one to sort it all out caused a massive blow up between my brother and I. I was furious, panicked, still a wreck emotionally and physically from mum's passing, and resentful that yet again he'd dodged any responsibility, and left it all to fall on me, at the worst possible time, and that it would be up to me to fix it.
That lit a fire under his behind, and within an hour or so he was rushing down to dad's bank branch in person with death certificates, and found out from the bank that the bank could pay the funeral directors directly, we just needed an invoice. So I told him to sort it out then. about
The funeral directors could have told us about the bank being able to pay them directly even during probate. It's hardly unusual, but they didn't. We found out from the bank after all of this. Brother then contacted that funeral home to tell them this, and bro told me that they were getting him an invoice, and that they'd be prepared to handle mum's funeral once the balance on dad's had been paid.
Given how badly they'd handled this, I didn't want to go with them for mum's funeral, and give them another five grands worth of business, nor have that pall hanging over mum's funeral, when it's going to be hard enough as it is. That yes, we owe them the remaining balance for dad's funeral, of course, but I wanted to find another funeral company for mum's.
I've already logged here that I was also trying to get in touch with Citizen's Advice, working with social workers through St Peter's Hospice, and with my doctor to sedate me enough to get through all of this, and talking to Co Op's legal and probate services to see how much it would cost to get their help to handle all the probate business, and researching it myself too, getting as much advice as I could and learning about what's involved myself, to see whether I could do it myself, or should just hire them to do it, and spend another £6,500 of mum and dad's money to do it, on top of the funeral costs, while also stressing about how we'd cover day to day bills and utilities for the house, given my bro and I were both on benefits and had been caregiving for the last few years, and were both struggling to picture future for ourselves. I was scared of losing the house!!
Anyway, in the end I went with the Co Op for mum's funeral, they didn't demand a down payment and understood about the probate situation and that once we have an actual invoice from them, we can pay them directly from the bank. Once we arranged that on the phone, they took mum into their care immediately, or the next day - either way I know it was fast, but then there was a gap where we couldn't have the meeting with the funeral director until Jan 18th, because after the holidays is a busy time of year for funeral homes. Anyway, I have no complaints about co-op, they've been great.
Yesterday I called them to make some more final choices, and to find out what other decisions need to be made so they can send an invoice rather than the estimate we have, so I can take the final invoices from co-op and the previous funeral company from dad's funeral into the bank and get both settled at the same time. Save me making two trips, what with my agoraphobia, and with everything else I have to arrange. Our funeral director wasn't available yesterday, but they said he'd call me this morning, and he did.
After telling him the choices we'd made, and finding out what else I need to settle before we can do the final invoice, and he assured me there's no hurry, the funeral isn't until Feb 12th, so there's plenty of time and no pressure on me. Then he mentioned they'd received an invoice from dad's funeral company with the charges for taking mum into their care before the Co Op collected her - plus a
DAILY CHARGE OF £25 PER DAY, so the invoice was
over £500!! He seemed surprised by the high cost of the invoice, said that there is usually a charge of around £200 since companies have to pay staff to collect the deceased etc, that usually gets rolled into the general cost of the funeral arrangements, but he was surprised by the £25 per day charges. As was I! They hadn't told us about these charges, despite my specifically asking about how much time we had to find someone else.
So I was shocked and furious. It's like they're punishing us, and it's outrageous to me that they can just rack up a bill like that with absolutely no agreement between us for that, then send it on to the other funeral company to be added to their invoice for the bank, without a word to us. So current funeral director asked me whether I wanted him to add it to their invoice, and I said no, could they send it to me? Because this was unacceptable and I wanted to challenge it. That I hadn't decided on making a complaint against that company before, but that I sure wanted to now, and was there like an ombudsman for funeral companies? He said there is absolutely an association, and agreed to send that invoice to me.
So I called that funeral company. Made it clear I was wanting to make a complaint, checking they were registered with the National Association of Funeral Directors and that I wanted the names of the two people who had contacted me on the 27th, wanted to make a formal complaint in writing about their handling of this business, and the bill they'd tried to sneak into the co-op's invoice, when I had specifically asked about a deadline for having another funeral company take mum into their care, and they'd failed to tell me about this expensive daily charge despite my specifically asking.
I got a more junior member of staff I think, who tried to placate me and said she'd put me through to a manager in their financial department, and I was passed to one, who said it was normal for there to be a charge to take someone into their care, but that normally the funeral company waives that and doesn't pass that cost onto the families, tried to shift the blame onto co-op, saying that they've also received invoices from co-op including daily charges, that they cover themselves and don't add to an invoice for the families to pay. But it sounds very much like they were 'Extracting the Michael', thinking they could get away with it, and being vindictive since we hadn't finished paying dad's bill yet. She said she'd look into it, and get those daily charges waived - and that if it was okay with me, she'd get in touch with co-op, and investigate how those calls to me on the 227th had been handled. That she is a manager there, and didn't have in the notes who had spoken to me, but that she'd look into it, contact co-op, then give me a call back on Tuesday.
It just seems like headache after heartache, one after another, more and more problems and expenses cropping up. But this feels very wrong on every level, and I'm now in a fighting mood and ready to tackle them. This isn't okay.
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