Funeral costs are becoming higher and higher every year. The average funeral costs around four thousand pounds today which are no easy amount for a middle-class family to pay. If you often worry about the issue of your funeral cost and how it could burden your family, at a time when they are already suffering from the loss of a loved one, you might be looking into funeral plans. The thing about funeral plans is that they can vary in prices as they do in the services they provide. However, there are some really affordable types of funeral plans that will not provide as many facilities as the more expensive ones would do, but if your priority is saving money you should consider these funeral plans:
Direct Cremation Funeral Plan
A direct cremation is not a commonly availed plan but has been becoming popular recently. This includes the direct cremation of the body and has no other facilities. It includes no church services, no hearse, and no procession of cars, no viewing facilities or other burial ceremonies as it is only applicable to cremation plans. This is by far the cheapest funeral plan that is available today. So, if you don’t have the means to afford the extras or simply don’t believe in all the ceremonial activities, direct cremation funeral plans might be the best suitable option for you.
Prepaid Funeral Plans
Prepaid funeral plans are the most widely used plans. These are not specifically the cheapest options but can be tailored to your financial needs. In a prepaid funeral plan, you have to pay beforehand to buy the plan and you get to plan your funeral yourself. If you have security issues, most experts suggest that you pre-plan your funeral rather than making an advanced payment for them. In this way, you would still get to plan your funeral and can withdraw from the company without any loss of money.
Prepaid funerals come in different forms. On My Net Research you can either pay the whole lump sum amount for the funeral plan you buy at the beginning or you can have it spilt up into monthly payments. This method of payment is what makes prepaid plans famously affordable. You can select a plan where you would pay monthly payments in three years, or you can even have it extended to five years with a small deposit amount. This makes the payment very easy for people.
Overseas Death Funeral
In case of an overseas death, most companies with which you have insurance will not support in facilitating overseas funerals and it will cost you about 10,000 pounds just to have the body brought back to the country and cremated/ buried. However, if you need to find a cheaper way to get this done, you can have the body cremated overseas and have the ashes delivered to the country. This will cost much less having the body delivered.
Other Tips on Saving Money in Funeral Plans
There are many ways to save money in funeral plans that might already be pretty affordable.
Doing Your Own Shopping
Funeral homes offer their own equipment but may be charging you heavily. If you know any shops or online buyers where you can get caskets, coffins or crematory urns for much cheaper go for it. This way you can have the shopping in your hands and handle it much more economically than the funeral home might just to charge a few extra pounds.
Renting Equipment
This is especially for the people who would like to have a viewing ceremony but prefer to be cremated as well. For the viewing ceremony, you would be requiring a casket which will go wasted when you are cremated. The economical option would be to rent the casket and buy the urn.
Tailored Funeral Plans
If you really want to make sure your funeral planning costs you just as much you want, look into tailored funeral plans. This way you can select everything from ceremonial plot to the flowers you want (or if you want extras at all) and save the money plans sometimes include on items you don’t care for.