Pre-Paid Funeral Plan - How Does It Work?

A pre-paid funeral plan is a safe, secure and cost-effective way to plan ahead for your or someone else’s funeral. 

G. Seller has been providing funeral plans for many years, working in association with Golden Charter.   G. Seller is an independent funeral director that has been established since 1910. We are passionate about providing the highest levels of bereavement care to the families we are privileged to serve. It is so important to deal with the people that will actually be looking after you so that you get the funeral you want without any unexpected costs, omissions or worries when you pass away. This can give you peace of mind that your loved one’s arranging your funeral so that they don’t have to make as many decisions, making a hard time, that little bit easier for them.

There are many different types of funeral plans and the vast number of options are ‘set’ or packaged choices. At G. Seller, we believe that your funeral plan should be put together in a way that is befitting to you and all of your wishes are properly collated.

The real benefit of taking out a funeral plan is the peace of mind that you have expressed your wishes for the funeral you want. This can include having conversations with your family about your wishes, including them in the conversation with the funeral director or putting everything together in readiness for when the time comes; knowing they’ll not have the emotional stress of having to decide on ‘what you would have wanted.’ 

The added benefit is that the funeral plan is fixing the funeral directors' costs at today’s prices, so, therefore, is protected against any future price increases. 

There are other benefits to having flexible ways to pay. The pre-paid funeral plan can be paid for in one lump sum, over 12 months at no interest or over 2 to 30 years. With the 2 to 30 years payment option, the funeral plan will have to be paid for by your 80^th birthday. 

Your funeral plan will grow at between 1% to 6% a year depending on market conditions. To find out where your money is invested, please see the section below ‘What Happens To My Money?’

G. Seller produces a Confirmation of Pre-Paid Funeral Arrangements document that you sign as the plan holder and our Plan Consultant that you have dealt with signs. We recommend you keep this somewhere safe with the rest of your information for your next of kin to easily find.

When you have passed away, we ask that your next of kin gives G. Seller (24/7) a call so we can explain the next steps with conveying you into our care. Depending on where you have passed away will depend on what happens but be rest assured, we will bring you into our care as soon as possible. For more information on immediate steps following someone’s passing, please visit our funerals page.

When your family or next of kin is ready, your appointed funeral director who will personally oversee all aspects of your funeral will arrange a convenient time to meet with your family to go through all of your funeral wishes and put a time & date in place. The G. Seller funeral director will find out the value of your plan and will invoice Golden Charter direct so your family have very little to do, apart from deciding when they’d like your funeral to take place and confirming all your wishes are still correct. Your funeral director will put together a confirmation of costs for your family. This shows what you originally paid into the plan for the funeral director’s professional services versus what they are at that present-day and how much money that has been saved. Also, it details the 3^rd party or disbursement costs that were originally paid into the plan versus what these costs are at that day's prices. The 3^rd party costs will have accrued growth on those values which are there to offset any of the increases since you took the plan out. If these costs have risen higher than the rate of growth, your estate will be asked to pay the difference. Alternatively, if the rate of growth on those costs has risen more than the 3^rd party costs have in reality, then your estate will receive a refund. 3^rd party costs are costs outside of the funeral director's control, such as minister or officiant fees, crematorium or cemetery fees, floral tributes or orders of service.

Your money is paid into the Golden Charter Trust. The trust fund is separate from G. Seller. The money is invested in a safe, secure and ethical way. The Golden Charter Trust invests in index-linked gilts, global equities, diversified growth and commercial property.

We are proud to say that the Trust is overfunded so therefore if the 800,000 people who have a funeral plan in the Golden Charter passed away, there would still be money left over. The image below shows a pie chart of the fund's allocation as of 31^st March 2021:

When you have passed away, we ask that your next of kin gives G. Seller a call (24/7) so we can explain the next steps with conveying you into our care. Depending on where you have passed away will depend on what happens but be rest assured, we will bring you into our care as soon as possible. For more information on immediate steps following someone’s passing, please visit our funerals page.

When your family or next of kin is ready, your appointed funeral director who will personally oversee all aspects of your funeral and will arrange a convenient time to meet with your family to go through the arrangements for you. 

It is not a problem you haven’t got a pre-paid funeral plan; the funeral director will put together an itemised estimate of funeral costs for whatever your family or next of kin decide on. There will be no hidden costs or sales tactics, G. Seller are here to look after you and your family as if you were part of our own family.

Paying for your funeral in advance should not mean you have less choice when it comes to your funeral wishes. Planning ahead can spare your loved ones much of the stress and uncertainty of organising a funeral when you sadly pass away. 

At G. Seller, we work in association with Golden Charter, and believe you should have the full range of options and you can be rest assured that there is no uncertainty about your final wishes. Get in touch with us today for more information.