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Bruce Hedley
13th Nov 2023
Here is a copy of the letter sent to the CEO of Co-Op Funeralcare:
It is with great regret that I feel the need to write to you, as I would rather simply forget the difficulties your organisation created for us as a family. However, not only do we still have a policy for my father’s funeral in the future, but I consider it my duty to try to prevent such stress for others facing loss, who may not have the family support we had.
I am going to itemise the points I feel show a real lack of attention to detail, underlying a lack of true concern and care for recently bereaved clients. Some may appear trivial, but I would request your patience to read the entire letter please, as the overall picture is important.
• Upon calling Co-Op shortly after my mum passed away, I was met with a truly unsympathetic, robotic question and answer session where inexperience was obvious as a checklist was read. This was unsettling, as we were dealing with a bereavement of just a couple of hours.
• Your organisation came to collect my mum’s body, for which I am grateful. However, the lack of care in removing her was quite astonishing. We only discovered some days later, upon extensive searching, that one of your ambulance people had picked up the set of dentures and pushed them in mum’s mouth. They belonged to my dad!
• We called the Earley funeral directors several times to ask them to check mum’s body in case dad’s teeth had somehow been taken with her but were assured that after a thorough check this was not the case. It took my brother physically visiting your morgue and demanding someone look while he waited, for your staff to find dad’s teeth in mum’s mouth. I cannot tell you how horrific this is! I am sure you can use your own imagination.
• Returning to the first day of the proceedings, I gave my email address and contact details to your staff and they promised they would send me all necessary details. Some days later I had not received anything and called them. They had mis-spelled my email address, but had not thought to call me to check I had received the information.
• I arranged to meet Sally Matthews, Funeral Director for Earley and Caversham Funeralcare with my dad and 2 older brothers on Wednesday 4 October at the funeral directors. I had a long discussion with her about all the proceedings and we agreed how to conduct the conversation in front of/with dad, so that at 90 years old, he would not be over-stressed. Upon arrival, she had handed over the meeting to someone else without having either briefed this person (Shelley) or having had the courtesy to tell me I was meeting with another representative.
• I had called the Earley branch on Monday 1 October to ensure they had received the clothing for mum to be dressed in and to confirm they would prepare mum’s body for dad’s arranged visit on Wednesday 3 October. Although I am a calm person by nature, I felt physically distressed that your representative told me he didn’t know where mum’s body was. I pointed out that this is a very poor comment to a bereaved relative and that she should find a better way to communicate.
• I had discussed with Shelly that dad wished to see mum in her coffin and had arranged for this to take place on the Wednesday’s visit. Despite several phone calls and reassurances that mum’s body would be prepared and dressed in the clothes we had delivered in advance, this had not been done. Dad was mentally prepared to see his wife of 67 years and we then had to arrange to bring him a second time. Not easy or considerate for a man of his age.
• When my dad, brother and dad’s carer came this second time to view mum’s body, the carer observed the plaque on the side of the coffin has spelled DIED as DIAD. Such poor attention to detail once again, requiring yet another call.
• The final coordination meeting for the funeral was conducted at 16:00 the day prior. This felt uncomfortably adjacent to the actual funeral the next day. We confirmed the details and conduct of proceedings including routing between venues, highlighting that Church Rd in Woodley was closed to traffic and they would need to take an alternative route. I took down Sally’s mobile number as the agreed coordination number should there be a need to speak on the day of the funeral.
• On the day of the funeral, I had met with Sally and the hearse driver at dad’s house. We proceeded to drive the short distance from dad’s house to church in a convoy of some 5 cars. The hearse driver took the wrong turn within moments, and I called our agreed contact number, which she did not answer. It took several wrong turns and the whole convoy stuck in a road with no access for her to realise. Apparently, Sally had put walk-mode into the satnav. Unfortunately, she then proceeded to take another wrong route, and we ended up some 20 mins late to the church.
• After the funeral, I was confused as to why the hearse stayed put outside the church for so long, as we had a fixed time slot for the crematorium and were already at least 20 mins late due to the delayed mentioned above. I asked the driver when they planned to leave and she said ‘whenever we like’. As someone who has not had to arrange many funerals, I would have expected the title of ‘Funeral Director’ to include some actual direction and help. I asked them to leave immediately and we then arrived with just 5 mins of our time slot left at the crematorium.
• On arriving at the crematorium, it was confusing to find that our chapel only had a notice of cremation for another person at 3pm, and no note at all of mum’s service at 12.45.
• On leaving the crematorium, we asked where to go next and how we take the flowers to the wake. Sally pointed right and said to go that way and we would find the garden on remembrance and they would bring the flowers. We did as ‘directed’ and found ourselves joining a group of people from a different funeral, no garden in sight. After much wandering around we found the garden of remembrance and waited.
• After waiting for nearly half an hour after the cremation, having already been delayed at every stage of the proceedings, the funeral staff were nowhere to be seen and the flowers had been left in the building. We fetched them ourselves and proceeded, very late, to join other friends and relatives for the wake. This was the only part of the whole day that went smoothly, and was the only part that had no input from the Co-Op.
I fully understand that mistakes can happen as this is part of human nature. However, the naumachy of instances led to excessive coordination and my losing faith in the ability of the funeral directors. The family chose to coordinate the Order of Service, flowers, Church Services independently and the extras offered for the coffin, motorcade, music and photographs were all declined. This was largely due to the interaction with the funeral directors. They remained, calm, polite and incompetent to deal appropriately with the detail required to deliver an adequate service.
My mum’s ashes remain with the funeral directors, and we will collect them when coordinated. I only ask that you review the performance of head office staff who take the initial call so they can move beyond reading a script to demonstrating empathy and competence with their role. I would wish Earley Funeral Directors is subject to a review. They must move beyond pleasantries and achieve a valuable attention to detail and competence which helps ensure an adequate service is provided.
The Co-Op is a large institution, and your reputation has been negatively impacted through the handling of my Mum’s funeral. I would wish to close off this episode and will clarify any points are they are helpful to you to appropriately deal with the issues, but I do not wish to debate whether my opinions about what has been observed are justified. Please understand the family remains astonished and disappointed with the service provided.
Yours sincerely
