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07-02-2026 4:03 PM
Possibly a postcode lottery?
With two of the three relatives whose affairs I was tasked to look after and their chosen undertakers, one closed and one moved. The closed one was a branch and the company's next nearest branch was 50 miles away. The one that moved, when the time came, I found had been taken over by another undertaker who naturally couldn't be expected to honour the previous company's funeral plan. (Closed due to retirement? as a family business, closed after 80 years.) With both, they'd've had to subcontract another undertaker, at least for repatriation, as T&Cs tend to limit it to 5 to 10 miles, which is the opposite of saving costs as intended by whoever takes out a funeral plan.
My solicitor companies would occasionally have clients whose chosen undertaker had moved or closed. It could elicit such emotion e.g. indignation, distress, bewilderment, I've heard it all or it feels like it, including how dare that undertaker close - they buried my father and his father before him (so couldn't close until they'd buried the third generation?).
Undertakers moving isn't unusual as they probably start as a small company then get bigger better premises as the business grows. Lucky are they in ideal premises throughout. Especially re parking the limos - I'm seeing this gradual expansion with a nearby town's undertakers, with them moving (within the town) every 10-15 years. At the moment they still have too little parking space. They also want more cars, we think it's so they can do two funerals at the same time. They say they might move 30 miles away to do it: I suspect to cheaper business rates and as it's near enough that die-hard loyal customers will stay with them.