Caller Highlights The Sad Reality Of Funeral Costs
16 January 2018, 14:39
After spending thousands for his dad’s funeral this caller’s options were restricted by the package he bought.
The average cost of a funeral in the UK is £4,500.
The cost of a cremation is around £3,500.
James O’Brien was questioning whether it needed to be this expensive.
Mark, whose father dies last week, called James to share his experience.
Mark told LBC that even before he went into actual funeral costs he was already looking at having to spend around £1,100.
Mark said the undertaker they had chosen to handle the funeral offered three packages, starting from a minimum of £2,000.
He discussed with James the “huge sum of money”.
“When you’re in that position money doesn’t come into your mind unless it’s a real burden,” he added.
After having to spend thousands Mark says he experienced constraints.
When it came down to organise a wake he was told he was “only allowed certain times because of his package”.
James brought up the example of a friend who had a slide show at the funeral and was charged per slide.
The caller said: ‘Oh my God’.
The conversation about funeral costs was inspired by an article by Sky News political correspondent Lewis Goodall on how ‘thousands of older people are dying without money to pay for a funeral’.
Lewis wrote the piece after his grandfather died last month.
