Preneed: A Pandora's Box of Problems
The wait for Ms. Garrett’s lawsuit against NPS, the Cassity family (and anyone remotely connected with the Cassity Consortium) ended on August 7th.
If half of the allegations made in the NPS Complaint are true, the misconduct perpetrated on funeral homes and consumers is shocking to say the least. The Complaint provides a bevy of…
News of Randy Sutton’s arrest was greeted by honking hearses in Missouri, Texas, Illinois, and a dozen or so other states. But, the question funeral directors are asking: What about the Cassity family?
Federal investigators need for someone to rollover and give up the Cassity crew, and apparently, Mr. Sutton is their choice.
Matt Damon’s…
While the settlement negotiated with the National Organization of Life and Health Insurance Guaranty Associations (“NOLHGA”) provides funding for the vast majority of NPS preneed contracts, there could be as many as 7,500 NPS preneed contracts that fall outside this coverage. For one of a couple of reasons, NPS never purchased an insurance policy for…
Officially, its called House Committee Substitute for Senate Substitute for Senate Committee Substitute for Senate Bill 1. Some of the ‘unofficial’ titles given this bill are not fit for publication.
It doesn’t matter who you talk to about Missouri’s current preneed reform bill, everyone has a complaint. Even the consumer advocates. Under normal circumstances…
Consumers and funeral directors are asking their state regulators how they let the National Prearranged Services collapse to happen. With the exception of Missouri and Iowa, the NPS preneed contract was generally an insurance-funded transaction, and state insurance regulators are taking most of the heat. It is a very different story in Missouri, as witnessed…
John Duggan has a point, and that’s what concerns regulators in Illinois, Missouri and Texas. Who will be blamed when the consumer does not get the benefit of their preneed contract?
While the overwhelming majority of NPS’ preneed contracts will be honored by the funeral home named in the contract as the “provider”, it…
The Missouri Senate Committee assigned the task of preneed funeral reform posted a substitute bill to the Legislature’s website on February 6th: SCS SB1. For those who participated in the Chapter 436 Working Group meetings last summer, this bill may seem vaguely familiar. During those meetings, the Division of Professional Registration circulated a 41-page…
Greed
Funeral directors who rejected NPS’ promises may feel justified in criticizing those who are asking for help. Generally, their criticism is that NPS exploited funeral directors’ greed. With regard to some trust rollovers, that may be true. But, what NPS best exploited was funeral directors’ desire to devote their time to the service of…
When its Halloween, the media is naturally attracted to a story that involves horror and a cemetery. The Belleville News-Democrat found a new type of horror for its seasonal article involving a cemetery: Missing Trust Funds!
For added suspense, the newspaper reports there are two cemeteries, and both were (or are?) owned and operated by…
During the long and tedious Chapter 436 hearings, some Missouri funeral directors joined consumer advocates in using the NPS failure as reason for recommending that legislators impose 100% trusting on the preneed transaction. Those funeral directors generally advocated the use of insurance or joint accounts as safer methods of preneed funding. During regulatory meetings, comments were also made about how…