It has come to our attention here at GFG Towers that some particularly bad practice is taking place on social media, compromising the integrity of funeral celebrancy as a profession. Whilst recognising that funeral celebrancy can be lonely work and there is a real need for support from colleagues, it’s suggested that anyone discussing their work online in peer-support groups is aware of the following: Facebook groups, even if closed, are not private. Don’t share anything in a Facebook group that you wouldn’t want to appear on the front page of a national newspaper. Posts can easily be replicated and shared outside of the group. Never breach client confidentiality. Be wary of discussing situations in anything but the vaguest of terms. No identifying information should ever be shared. Never reveal the identities of people attending funerals. Respect mourners’ right to privacy, no matter who they are. Be mindful of the advice you’re given by peers. Whilst fully supporting colleagues in sharing their strength, hope and experience online, please exercise caution, discretion and professionalism at all times. A Serious Cause for Concern published first on YouTube via Tumblr A Serious Cause for Concern
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There’s no point in trying to rationalize it or sugar coat it… no one likes having to attend the funeral service of someone they know and love. Even as funerals get closer to becoming a one-of-a-kind celebration of life, at the end of the day, a funeral marks the end of a loved one’s life… […] Continue reading 3 Pet Peeves Families Have About Funerals… And How Funeral Pros Can Fix Them on funeralOne Blog. 3 Pet Peeves Families Have About Funerals… And How Funeral Pros Can Fix Them published first on YouTube via Tumblr 3 Pet Peeves Families Have About Funerals… And How Funeral Pros Can Fix Them Can you believe that we are nearly two months into the start of 2017?! It seems like just yesterday we were mapping out our New Year’s resolutions and creating a game plan for a happier, more successful year of funerals. But now it’s mid-February and most of us have come face-to-face with what I like […] Continue reading How 5 Funeral Pros Are Serving Families Better In 2017 on funeralOne Blog. How 5 Funeral Pros Are Serving Families Better In 2017 published first on YouTube via Tumblr How 5 Funeral Pros Are Serving Families Better In 2017 Back in 2015, we reported on this blog about the legal skirmish between funeral plan providers Safe Hands Funeral Plans and Golden Charter – see here to refresh your memory. A paragraph from that blog post came to mind today: ‘While the lawyers order trebles all round and get ready to enwrap both parties in litigation for as long as legally possible, the good citizens of Funeralworld tremble. A lot of heavily soiled linen looks like being washed in public. God forbid that the public learn just how much of the money they spend on a funeral plan gets divvied up among sundry predators in the form of commissions, sales and marketing costs, directors’ wages, you name it.’ Well, thanks to the wonderful world of t’internet, that very information is now available in an easy to read table, showing just how much money is taken out of the total cost of a funeral plan in non-funeral related fees. Thanks to John Taplin from Open Pre-Paid Funerals Ltd for providing this link. Have a look here. Or, for a quick précis, we’ll summarise a couple of the lesser know facts listed in the table for you.
So, it is entirely possible that the money you pay in good faith for a funeral plan, thinking that you’re addressing the ever more hysterical annual announcements of the rising costs of funerals escalating beyond comprehension yet again, will in fact be whittled down to the bare bone when death occurs and the funeral needs to be arranged. A pocketful of cash here, a handful of cash there, all disappearing from that plan price in the direction of administration and commission before the ink is even dry on the medical certificate of the cause of death. As an example, we were told this week about a funeral director receiving a call from one of the funeral plan providers listed above. The plan provider invited the funeral director to carry out a funeral for a plan holder who had just died. The plan holder had paid £3,595 for their funeral. It included all the traditional aspects of a funeral, collecting and caring for the person who had died, providing a coffin, dressing them and providing chapel visits, all professional assistance with the funeral, providing a hearse and a limousine and the third party costs. So far so what, you might think. £3,595.00 sounds about ok for what is being provided? Well, the amount that the funeral director was offered for undertaking this funeral was actually £2,445.00. And, of that £2,445.00, £1,100.00 was allocated for the third party costs. In fact, the third party costs totalled just under £1,200.00. So the funeral director, the one actually doing the funeral, was effectively invited to do so for £1,245.00. That’s just £145 more than the £1,100.00 that had whistled out of the original payment to persons unknown in administration fees and commission payments. The funeral director concerned politely declined the offer. They couldn’t make the sums add up. The person who paid £3,595.00 for their plan and who died thinking their funeral was all sorted is none the wiser. Their family is probably none the wiser. The plan provider may have found a funeral director willing to carry out this funeral for £1,245.00 and nobody will be any the wiser. We think it stinks. There is a whole can of worms writhing underneath the label of ‘Funeral Plans’. Thousands are sold each year to unwitting purchasers who want to are seduced by lines such as ‘We Believe Your Loved Ones Shouldn’t Be Left With Any Surprise Bills’ (capital letters not our own), or ‘A pre-paid funeral plan from the UK’s largest provider ensures peace of mind for you and your family’. There’s a very nice living to be made from selling funeral plans offered by the big six providers, but not such a good one from carrying out the actual funerals involved. If you are thinking about planning your funeral in advance, do your homework. The only plan provider that we rate is Open Pre-Paid Funerals Ltd. So highly do we rate them, we have developed our own, unique alternative to funeral plans in partnership with them. It stands apart from every other offering on the market. It’s the GFGPlan. GFGPlan puts your interests first. There is an administrative fee of £195.00 (and £25 of that is donated to the Good Funeral Guide). Other than that, we make no deductions whatever from the money you give us to look after for you. Zilch. Not one penny is spent on salaries, nobody gets a commission, and there are no free pens. Read about it here.
There’s an unpleasant odour emanating from somewhere.. published first on YouTube via Tumblr There’s an unpleasant odour emanating from somewhere.. When it comes to funerals, there seems to be a veil between what families think of the funeral process and what actually happens behind the scenes. Everything from the way that families view funeral professionals (“they’re crooks who are just out to make a buck”) to the value that they feel funerals provide (“they’re a […] Continue reading 5 Funeral Articles You NEED To Share With Your Families on funeralOne Blog. 5 Funeral Articles You NEED To Share With Your Families published first on YouTube via Tumblr 5 Funeral Articles You NEED To Share With Your Families Filed under: Accounts Receivable, Funeral Director Training, Funeral Operations/Training, Leadership Tagged: Funeral Business Consulting, Funeral Home Operations Funeral Director Training: The Birds & The Bees. published first on YouTube via Tumblr Funeral Director Training: The Birds & The Bees. “In this world, nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes.” – Benjamin Franklin Well, Ben, I am uncertain about that these days! While death and taxes are here to stay, how we deal with those two certainties certainly has changed. No longer does it seem strange or uncomfortable to ditch the […] Continue reading Guest Post: When Will The Funeral Profession Go The Way Of Uber and Airbnb? on funeralOne Blog. Guest Post: When Will The Funeral Profession Go The Way Of Uber and Airbnb? published first on YouTube via Tumblr Guest Post: When Will The Funeral Profession Go The Way Of Uber and Airbnb? Despite its ever-growing popularity, cremation still hasn’t exactly found favor within the community of funeral professionals. It’s kind of like the new kid on the block… the one from a place we don’t recognize, who we haven’t quite figured out just yet. At least, that’s how the subject of cremation is often regarded by funeral […] Continue reading Why Funeral Professionals Need To Stop Hating On Cremation on funeralOne Blog. Why Funeral Professionals Need To Stop Hating On Cremation published first on YouTube via Tumblr Why Funeral Professionals Need To Stop Hating On Cremation Inside the ecoLegacy Dublin HQ Towards the end of last year, we listened to Tony Ennis of ecoLegacy speaking at the ICCM conference about his soon-to-be released new alternative to cremation. What he had to say to the packed conference room was so fascinating that the GFG decided we needed to know more. So on a chilly January morning, Fran hopped on a flight to Dublin to spend the day at the ecoLegacy HQ. ‘I have to say, I went to Dublin not really knowing what to expect. Everything I had heard from Tony made sense, I’d done lots of background reading about him and his project, and it all appears to be 100% genuine. But I also thought that this was too good to be true, and that there had to be a catch. I have to report, dear reader, that if there is one, I haven’t found it. It is quite possible that I was privileged enough to be among the earliest people to be shown something that is groundbreaking – and game changing – for the ways that we deal with our dead. Everything that I saw and was told makes sense. The people involved are passionate and genuine. Huge amounts of research have been done. Various processes have been trialled and found wanting, so the engineers started over and tried a different way until they found the solution. The potential issues with current law in the UK have been addressed. There are very eminent bodies overseeing and interested in what Tony is doing (his work is being overseen by Imperial College), and the main players in the funeral industry have all already been to Dublin to be shown the unit and given the tour as I was. It seems to me that it’s simply a matter of time before the first ecoLegacy unit is available to UK clients – and probably not much time at that. Then we will see how the public respond to something completely new. My instinctive feeling is that it will be phenomenally successful.’ Read the information from ecoLegacy for yourself below. And if you have any questions, write them in the comments. We’ll get Tony to respond. “Basically, ecoLegacy has developed “cremation 2.0”, a next-generation, environmental and ethical alternative to burial and cremation called ecoLation. It will ensure a greener planet and cleaner air. The company has its headquarters in Ireland and is currently operating in the UK and the US. The idea was inspired by Philip Backman, a US scientist and teacher, who came up with the original idea around 1971, the same year Tony Ennis was born. ecoLegacy’s goal is to make Phil’s vision a reality and scale it globally and this is currently happening with initial orders coming in from all across Europe and the US. (more info here http://www.ecolegacy.com/philip-backman-a-moment-of-clarity/) ecoLation is a flameless form of cremation. It has developed a thermal process that uses cold and heat and pressure. It reduces emissions and poisons from reentering the earth’s precious and delicate eco systems.It is respectful to the body, it is respectful to the family and it is respectful to the planet. So what happens when a loved one dies and has chosen ecoLation? First they cool the body to just the right temperature. The body is placed inside a pod, the temperature is lowered and the body is chilled. Water is released back and forth over the body reducing the remains down into ice particles. These particles are filtered through to a unit that recreates the earth’s natural process that normally takes thousands of years. All toxins and chemicals we build up while living are neutralised and the result is completely organic nutrient rich remains. A tiny seed – of a plant, a tree or a flower can be placed into this powder and, coupled with soil, water and love, you or your loved one can grow into a beautiful strong tree or your favorite flower. In terms of efficiency, the unit uses electric energy to get up to temperature and to create the right conditions. However, as the remains are ecoLated, they break down on a molecular level and release a very clean bio gas. This gas is turned into heat energy which is then used to power the system. Whilst there will always be an energy requirement, it is brought back as close to zero as possible through our technology. In the next 70 years, the Earth’s population will reach and probably soar past 10 billion people. ecoLegacy offers an ecological choice to funeral directors and families that will ensure a greener planet and cleaner air and thus a healthier ecosystem. Unlike burial and cremation, ecoLation offers a pure, more sustainable choice and breathes new life into the earth in plant form. In the next 100 years, at current rates, we will need to bury or cremate more than 10 billion people. A staggering 54% of the world’s population lives on just 3% of the land, in cities, where the urban landscape cannot accept further burial or afford the pollution side effects of burning our dead. Typically funeral home clients have the two standard alternatives presented to them, but from an environmental, ecological, ethical or indeed practical standpoint, neither of these two methods are sustainable for the long term. Current burial rates are unsustainable in our modern world. More and more we can detect the effects of burial from fluids leaching into our soil and water courses. This hazardous waste also contains embalming fluids and, in recent times, a huge degree of chemicals from end of life drugs administered. Not to be overlooked either are the harmful pathogens that live on after we die, or the veneer on the coffins etc. We are running out of space too. Cremation, a method becoming more popular, has relatively high pollution levels, releasing on average 400kg of CO2 per body into the atmosphere. Cremation is also responsible for a number of other pollutants and dioxins and of course it consumes fossil fuel in the form of either oil or gas. ecoLation is clean. There are no emissions of harmful chemicals. The body is ethically treated and all metals and foreign compounds removed. There are no chemicals active, no diseases still alive, no issues in relation to leaching and no carbon / heavy metals or dioxins. The remains are totally sterile, totally natural and totally clean. It’s a new way to be remembered.” Tony Ennis with one of the ecoLation pods The future’s bright, the future’s….. published first on YouTube via Tumblr The future’s bright, the future’s….. Despite its ever-growing popularity, cremation still hasn’t exactly found favor within the community of funeral professionals. It’s kind of like the new kid on the block… the one from a place we don’t recognize, who we haven’t quite figured out just yet. At least, that’s how the subject of cremation is often regarded by funeral […] Continue reading Why Funeral Professionals Need To Stop Hating On Cremation on funeralOne Blog. Why Funeral Professionals Need To Stop Hating On Cremation published first on YouTube via Tumblr Why Funeral Professionals Need To Stop Hating On Cremation |
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