At least I was able to comply with my mother’s request for the simplest possible coffin. She disliked extravagance. Also, the coffin was for a cremation, which she asked for. The coffin was not even present at the memorial service, where we remembered her and celebrated her life.
At least I was able to comply with my mother’s request for the simplest possible coffin. She disliked extravagance. Also, the coffin was for a cremation, which she asked for. The coffin was not even present at the memorial service, where we remembered her and celebrated her life.
By contrast, when I buried my father I was so overcome with emotion that he would have disapproved of how much I had spent on the casket. After the experience of my father’s interment, when I was unable even to think of cost, I was determined to be more careful when dealing with my mother’s final arrangements. Nevertheless, I had not planned for the funeral. Though my mother was 86 years old, and frail, her death still came as a shock. My planning was all about how to ensure she was at least comfortable for some time to come.
When it comes to funerals, most South Africans do plan. More South Africans have funeral cover than life insurance, most of it informal. According to Finscope South Africa 2012, an annual study of South Africans’ financial behaviour, 28% of South Africans belong to a burial society; 10% have funeral cover from an undertaker of funeral parlour and 15% have funeral cover with a bank or building society. By contrast only 12% of South Africans have life insurance.
Wealthier South Africans know their families or their estates will provide for funeral expenses. The truly poor can rely on the State in the form of a so-called “pauper’s funeral”.
In general, death is both a financial and an emotional blow. For many South Africans providing a funeral of a certain standard, including providing exceptional quantities of food for mourners, is a matter of cultural necessity. A 2008 US National Bureau of Economic Research study of funeral arrangements of almost 4 000 KwaZulu-Natal residents between 2003 and 2005 found that on average, households spent the equivalent of a year’s income for an adult’s funeral. You can see why burial societies play an important role in South Africa, alongside more formal funeral cover.
Even so, burial societies and formal funeral insurance only cover part of the expenses associated with burial. A Finscope 2007 study found that 8% of adult South African residents had contributed to a family funeral in the past 12 months – over and above money that two thirds of them had already paid into a burial society. And 10% of those surveyed said they would borrow, or would probably have to borrow money to cover funeral expenses.
These expenses can include a number of things as well as food and drink for mourners, including the cost of travel for family members to attend the ceremony. But what does a typical funeral itself cost? This is a question that never occurred to me, and I’m sure doesn’t occur to many people in the midst of grief.
A Gauteng Enterprise Propeller 2010 study put the minimum cost, from an independent undertaker, at R2 800 for a “basic funeral” during the week, and says this takes care of most of the funeral costs, including a car for family members. From my own experience, that is quite cheap.
The study does go on to say that the cost of a basic funeral from a leading undertaker costs quite a bit more at R8 500, though this includes a number of services including a marquee. Again, I find this quite reasonable. The cost of an elaborate funeral from the same leading funeral service provider, the study says, can rise as high as R34 000, and this would include an “upmarket” hearse and a sumptuous coffin.
Compare this to the DIY, online private non-attended cremation” service offered by a company operating in KZN, Just Cremations, at R5 280. Remember, cremation itself costs less than burial, because of the cost of digging and filling in a grave. If you let the undertaker do all the paperwork and collect the body, and you attend the cremation, the cost rises to around R9 000.
Local prices for burials and cremations may well differ, and you could even shop around for the best price. Remember the hidden costs, and that you might not be able to access money in the dead person’s estate to pay for the funeral.
It seems cold-blooded, but perhaps we should all establish the likely cost of a funeral before we have to. Dealing with grief puts money matters out of mind. While being stingy is a sin, profligacy is also wrong, and we owe it to the living and the dead not to throw money away.
