Funeral planning is essential: don’t leave your loved ones to do a difficult job, made worse because they are grieving. We know that it isn’t an easy task having to plan for our own funeral. Dying is a taboo topic for a lot of people as it is not something we want to believe will happen to us, even though we know it will.

However, if you haven’t taken out funeral insurance, when you do eventually pass, your family is suddenly going to have to find the money to pay for a funeral and this will almost certainly add to their stress levels at an already very difficult time.

How much money are we talking about?

Conservatively, a funeral – whether a burial or a cremation – can cost anything from R7,000 upwards. Funerals often cost considerably more depending on the choice of coffin, the flowers, the catering, etc. Sometimes relatives have to be transported long distances to attend a funeral, and there are often unexpected costs that suddenly add up to scary amounts of money.

This is why funeral insurance was invented.  We don’t want to presume too much about your finances but we believe that if everyone knew just how reasonable the cost of funeral cover was, they’d find a way to afford it.

So what does having funeral cover entail?

For less than R100 a month, you can get funeral cover for yourself and up to 13 family members. This means you can include extended family like grandparents, aunts and uncles, and in-laws in your own funeral plan. It’s not a lot to pay for the comfort of knowing that at the most painful moments of their lives, your loved ones won’t have to add money worries to their stresses.

One of the most reassuring things about having funeral insurance is that payment is made within 24 hours of claiming, so you can go ahead and book a funeral knowing that it will be paid for.  A good funeral plan will take other costs into consideration too, such as:

  • A sum of money to cover the cost of catering, both for the event and for the family because the assets of the deceased are temporarily frozen until their estate is wound up. This is called a grocery benefit.
  • An unveiling benefit so that a headstone becomes affordable.
  • Free cell phone airtime so that the family can afford the cost of organising a funeral and other formalities.

We might not like thinking about the subject of funerals – our own or our families – but we think it’s better for us to think this through so that our families don’t have to when they’re grieving.

As with all money matters, don’t leave planning until the last minute. As unappealing as it may be to think about passing on, we need to plan for beyond the grave.