Most of industry leaders, including the NFDA, seem resigned to the reality that the Funeral Rule will be amended to require the posting of price lists on funeral home websites in some form or fashion. But the FTC extension of the comment deadline from January 3rd to January 17th indicates the Commission does value
Uncategorized
Funeral Rule Readability: What Makes for a Good GPL?
By Bill Stalter on
Posted in Compliance, Uncategorized
The next-to-last section of the Funeral Rule notice (Issues 32-36) deals with what the FTC calls Price List Readability. This seemed to us as a very nebulous phrase, and so we searched “Price List Readability” in the context of the Consumer Funeral Alliance, and lo and behold, the CFA has guidelines for what it…
FTC’s 40 Issues: Confirming Delivery of Price Lists to the Online Shopper
By Bill Stalter on
With Issues No. 10 through 15 of the FTC’s Funeral Rule notice, the agency begins inquiries on how to ensure the online shopper has access to all of the funeral home’s price lists before making any selections. Would it be sufficient to require the funeral home’s website to provide links for downloading the GPL (and…
FTC’s “Forty Issues” and the Funeral Rule Comment Period: Time to Get Serious
By Bill Stalter on
By a posting made November 1, the Federal Trade Commission gave formal notice of its intent to revise the Funeral Rule and opened a 60 day comment period. The notice is quite lengthy and signals that that the FTC wants major revisions to the Funeral Rule that go well beyond whether to require the posting…
Missouri Funeral Trust: Is there anything to be learned from Wisconsin?
By Bill Stalter on
Posted in Uncategorized
When the MFT’s previous preneed exam was making news during the summer of 2015, reorganization plans were being filed for the Wisconsin Master Trust and the California Master Trust. As we reported in “Association Master Trusts: De Facto Trustees”, each reorganization plan sought to eliminate the association’s de facto trustee relationship that had…
Missouri Funeral Trust: Just how much is this costing consumers and funeral homes?
By Bill Stalter on
Posted in Uncategorized
When the MFDEA Preneed Portability video disclosed that expense distributions were being paid from the Missouri Funeral Trust to the association, we thought it was appropriate to revisit prior blog posts about the failures of association master trusts in Illinois, Wisconsin, Minnesota and California. Those state association master trusts were forced to close, to restructure…
NPS Receivership Wind Down: Does this foreshadow an end to Missouri Third Party Sellers?
By Bill Stalter on
Late in 2021, PNC Bank threw in the towel. After years of litigation and two appeals, PNC Bank agreed to a settlement with the NPS special deputy receiver. Last month, our Illinois clients began receiving POC notices from the SDR that a portion of their claims for inflation would be honored. Payment of funeral home…
Preneed Fraud: What Statute of Limitations?
By Bill Stalter on
Posted in Compliance, Uncategorized
A former Kentucky funeral director has been charged with multiple felony preneed thefts, some of which occurred 25 years ago. Various news sources report that Donald Creech began pocketing consumer preneed payments as early as 1996. The consumer preneed payments were to have been forwarded to the Kentucky Funeral Directors Association’s master trust. Until he…
Setting the Record Straight: Derailing Missouri Preneed Reform
By Bill Stalter on
Posted in Missouri - SB1, Uncategorized
In this post we are breaking a rule that we have followed since the startup of the blog: maintaining the anonymity of a source. In our post Derailing Missouri Preneed Reform we referred to our source as having an irrefutable reputation within the industry. Those who follow this blog instantly understood that the statement had…
Setting the Record Straight: Preneed Audits will be Delayed Until Further Notice
By Bill Stalter on
Posted in Missouri - SB1, Uncategorized
In an earlier post we reported how the acting director for the Division of Professional Registration advised the Governor that State Board changes were needed to be made “to increase efficiency and fiscal responsibility.” Improvements were needed, “especially with inspections and financial examinations”, and that there could be potential cost savings of $200,000. In a…