Preneed: A Pandora's Box of Problems
It is encouraging when funeral directors and consumer advocates engage in meaningful debate about the future of Missouri’s preneed industry. And, there seems to be some consensus that the non-guaranteed contract should have a greater presence in the state.
In the third of six scheduled meetings, industry and consumers were faced with those prickly issues of the trusting…
Regulators and preneed sellers squared off recently over the subject of who owns the preneed trust fund: the funeral home or the consumer. Hearings to reform Missouri’s preneed law hit a wall when the issues of trusting requirements, income accrual and portability was taken up by a review committee comprised of regulators, industry representatives and consumers.
In a debate…
So why is it so tough to provide preneed portability? Because the transaction has been defined by state law as a contract between a consumer and a death care company, and federal regulators tend to agree. When the issue has arisen in the context of federal preemption, the interests of the state regulator have prevailed…
Before the guaranteed preneed contract, funeral directors accepted pre-payment on funeral arrangements as an accommodation to their families. Funds were typically placed in a joint account or POD account at the local bank. As this practice became more common, “preneed’ laws were passed to establish requirements regarding the deposit and withdraw of funds. These laws were fairly simple…
On June 11th, Senator Delbert Scott met with a number of death care industry members and regulators to begin mapping out the direction for preneed reform in Missouri. From that meeting, it was decided that the state’s death care regulators would form review committees that would facilitate a dialog on the issues, and…
As news of the NPS meltdown began to leak last month, several proposals to reform Missouri’s preneed law were hastily drafted. Not knowing the extent of NPS’ problems, some reform advocates felt the need to strike while the iron was hot.
Even as the legislative session ended on May 16th, it was not clear whether…
Yesterday, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch ran an article that examined the history of NPS, and raised some of the questions that need to be explored in depth in the months to come. The system failed in several states, for both consumers and funeral homes. While most funeral homes will try to make good on the…
The Missouri preneed industry faces a long and stormy summer.
The Missouri legislature seems to be listening to regulators’ requests for much needed authorities for examinations, audits and rulemaking. A draft bill providing emergency powers to the Division of Professional Registration has emerged as legislation that may be signed into law before the current session ends…
With two reform bills (HB 2469 and HB 2594) already introduced into the legislature, and two substitute proposals in the works, Missouri legislators and regulators are committed to fixing a law that allowed NPS to exploit consumers and funeral homes. However, consumers and the death care industry are both having difficulty analyzing the specifics of…
The preneed bill that angered the Funeral Consumers Alliance in February continues to advance within the Tennessee legislature. SB 2705/HB 2763 has been placed on the calendar for the Commerce Committee for April 1st. If passed, the legislation may well make Tennessee the first state to lower its preneed trusting requirement. Despite the need for…