Funeral planning checklist
Most of a funeral plan is information your family would otherwise have to hunt for on a hard day. Gather it once, keep it where they can find it, and the planning meeting goes quickly.
Your wishes
- Burial, cremation or entombment, and where: a cemetery plot, a mausoleum crypt, a niche, or something else. Compare burial and cremation.
- The service: at the funeral home, a church or a graveside; a rosary or prayer service; a viewing or not; a gathering afterward.
- Personal touches: music, readings or verses, flowers, clothing, jewelry to keep or return to the family, and who should speak.
- People with a role: clergy or celebrant, musicians, pallbearers, and any fraternal or military honors.
- Memorial gifts you would like in place of flowers, and whether you are an organ donor.
Information the funeral home will ask for
- Full legal name, date and place of birth, and addresses.
- Parents' names, including your mother's maiden name, and their birthplaces.
- Marital status, spouse's name, and the names and cities of children and siblings.
- Occupation, employer, education, and the cities you have lived in, for the obituary and the death certificate.
- Military service: branch, dates, rank, and where your discharge paper (DD-214) is kept.
Do not type your Social Security number into any website form, including ours. It goes on paper, at the meeting.
Where things are
- Your will, living will or advance directive, and your attorney's name.
- Life insurance policies, the cemetery deed if you own a plot, and any existing funeral arrangement.
- Who the executor is, and how to reach them.
- What should happen to your social media accounts: memorialized or closed.
Keep the finished record at home where your family knows to look, not only in a safe deposit box that may be hard to open right away.
Who to call
A short list of the people to notify, and the first two calls: the funeral home and your counselor. What advance planning covers.
Get a free printed planning guide
Billy has printed planning guides in English and Spanish with space to write all of this down. Ask for a free copy and choose "Send me a free planning guide" on the form. He will get one to you and answer any questions, with no obligation.