Funeral Price Survey — 2009

Survey description

The Funeral Consumers Alliance of the Finger Lakes surveyed funeral prices in its service area during the spring and summer of 2009. This area, centered on Tompkins County, includes parts of eight surrounding counties. Twenty-nine businesses that operate a total of 33 funeral homes provided their General Price Lists. Some funeral homes cooperated by submitting the lists in post-paid envelopes provided by the Alliance. We gratefully acknowledge this cooperation. The remaining funeral homes made their price lists available only when an Alliance member visited. This availability is the minimum required under federal regulations.
     
Prices for 14 types of services and two categories of merchandise were extracted from each price list. In addition, an index related to the price of a full-service funeral was compiled for each funeral home. Data are presented in three tables and represent a good-faith effort to correctly interpret each General Price List. Table 1 has prices for limited services, such as direct cremation and direct burial, that include a funeral home’s Basic Arrangements charge. Prices of the cheapest casket and/or alternative container and the cheapest vault are also shown, as is the full-service funeral price index for each funeral home. The index is the total price of nine services (no merchandise). Table footnote (h) lists items included in the index. Table 2a and Table 2b show the Basic Arrangements charge at each funeral home, followed by the prices of components of full-service funerals, the full-service funeral price index, and footnotes. The Basic Arrangements charge is explained on the page about the FTC Funeral Rule, item 4.

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