Choosing a home funeral
"Dying well, on your own terms, prepared and supported, can be your greatest subversive act" - Zenith Virago
Arranging a funeral yourself - or planning your own - will not only save you a fortune but means whatever you do will be completely personal. A ceremony arranged by family and friends can be far more meaningful than a funeral service provided by even the nicest and most professional of strangers. As it is an unfamiliar process to most of us there is a steep learning curve, and the unpleasant reality of dealing with a dead body is something not everyone will be keen to face. However, any reasonably courageous family or group of friends can roll up their sleeves and do what is needed if they are motivated enough, and in most cases the financial, emotional and spiritual rewards will be well worth the effort.
Many people do not realise that in New Zealand:
- There is NO legal requirement for you to use a funeral director. Any ordinary person can arrange a funeral. However local councils may have their own requirements concerning the presence of a funeral director at a burial or even a cremation, so it pays to check what these are.
- There is NO legal requirement for a body to be embalmed, except in the case of repatriation. However, choosing not to have this done means you may have to make arrangements more quickly, and also means you will experience first hand at least some of the stages of body decomposition which are usually halted and masked by embalming.
- There ARE certain legal paperwork and practical requirements. However anyone can carry these out if they know what to do. The page Arranging a burial or cremation goes into these requirements in detail.
To watch an excellent presentation on the "why" of spending time with and taking care of our own dead, I recommend this excellent talk on the Youtube channel End Well by the one and only Caitlin Doughty.
A simple and rather irritating but still useful video on what happens to a dead body as it starts to decompose can be viewed here; and a much more graphic but far more fascinating video on body decomposition in natural circumstances can be viewed here. If you have never seen a dead body before it may be quite confronting to watch this - but again, this is reality and knowledge is power.
Things you will need to consider - the practicalities of dealing with a dead body
For a straightforward death, for instance of an aged parent who dies at home, in hospital or in a rest home, where their medical history is known and the Coroner is not involved, dealing with their dead body means someone will have to carry out the following tasks:
- Organising everything to do with legal compliance and paperwork. That means liaising with many people and agencies to obtain certificates, make bookings, pay fees and fill out forms correctly. The agencies may include doctors, hospitals, rest homes, mortuaries, local council and government bodies including the crematorium or cemetery and the Registrar of Births, Deaths and Marriages;
- Obtaining or constructing a casket and having access to a vehicle which can transport it, as well as enough people to carry it with the weight of a dead body inside;
- Physically handling, cleaning, dressing the body and placing it in the casket, quite possibly after rigor mortis has set in;
- Arranging a funeral or other gathering, which may require hiring a venue, instructing a celebrant, arranging catering and notifying people of the person's death directly and through placement of notices;
- Keeping the body cool for the duration of all these events and experiencing first hand the initial stages of body decomposition. In many cases these changes will not be drastic (especially in the case of old frail people who are already thin and dehydrated) but they may, at their worst, include discolouration and possibly slippage of the skin, bloating of the stomach, the eyes and mouth not remaining closed, leakage of body fluids and the development of an unpleasant odour;
- Arranging the person's cremation or burial, usually with a local council which will require payment in advance, transporting the casket to its place of final cremation or interment and collecting any ashes afterwards.
Your personal situation
A DIY funeral will work best when the person's death was anticipated and you have had time to plan. For everything to go smoothly you will need to act quickly, have funds available to pay for the outgoings, and have the support of others. An ideal situation is if family members and friends are readily available so that different tasks can be delegated to different people. A less ideal situation is where a family is not well resourced, or where there is disagreement about what should happen because the dead person's wishes were not clear. In either case you will be faced with the reality of dealing with a dead person and seeing their body go through changes which in a worst case scenario will not be pleasant, and which you may not have witnessed before. Seeing a loved one in this condition will be traumatic for some people.
If a death was accidental or particularly shocking, if the person who has died is very large or if the family is in conflict, it might be better to let professionals handle the funeral. Embalming might be necessary in some cases, for instance if the body is to be kept in an open casket for some days, or the funeral is to be delayed significantly. When relatives are not close by, or there is a family dispute, the services of a funeral home may genuinely be needed.
Dealing with bureaucracy
Usually local council websites are very informative about their procedures for cremation and burial, and cemetery and crematorium staff are very helpful. However there is wide variation around the country not only as to the cost of burials and cremations, but also in the level of support for DIY funerals. Local councils do have a lot of control in this area and you will need to contact yours to make sure what you want to do is permitted. My webpage Arranging a burial or cremation goes into a lot of detail about what is required but to see an excellent example of what most local councils will want, see Whakatane District Council's excellent webpage here.
In Wellington both public crematoria will accept bookings from families who are doing it all themselves. However I have heard that in Auckland some councils require a licensed funeral director to be present at both cremations and burials. In the case of burials this seems to be so that they can avoid providing staff at the graveside and still be sure that someone will know how to operate the lowering equipment properly. In the case of cremation I have no idea what the reasoning is. Whatever it might be, it flies in the face of national legislation which allows anybody to act as a funeral director. I can only suggest you look around until you find a cemetery which is supportive of DIY funerals (I hope to provide a list of them at some stage), or do what you can to find a way around these requirements.
Private ownership
Another potential obstacle to a DIY funeral is that the crematoria in your local area may be privately owned or operated. In that case you may find that to use the facilities you will either have to buy a package from the company which owns the facility, or at least pay a substantially higher amount than you would at a public crematorium. If you are dealing with a privately owned crematorium you can still ask what they will charge for the services you actually need. Another option will be to find the nearest public crematorium (which may be some distance from your dead person) and drive them there - although if the person was not normally resident in the borough where the crematorium is located, you may have to pay an additional "out of district" fee.
Funeral insurance
Funeral insurance can be expensive, but if you have it, you may as well use it. Depending on the type of insurance you may be able to use it to cover the cost of a DIY funeral. Some policies are provided by organisations such as FDANZ and only cover services provided by funeral directors who are members of that organisation. You will need to find out exactly what the insurance you have will and will not cover.
The WINZ funeral grant
WINZ will sometimes cover funeral costs up to the amount of $2445.37. This grant is means tested and may be available whether or not the person who died was a beneficiary. It is nowhere near enough to cover the cost of a funeral home's full range of services but it should be enough to cover the costs of a direct cremation or a home funeral. The grant will only be paid in reimbursement of invoices, so payments for the casket and cremation or burial will need to be made up front and then claimed back after the funeral. Information on how the grant works and how to apply can be found here.
The final decision
Ultimately you have to decide if you, your friends and family are willing and able to shoulder the significant responsibilities involved in carrying out a DIY funeral, and to cope with the demands that will be placed upon you. If you have talked about it and you are willing to take the necessary steps, this page will help you to plan ahead.