Arrangements
What to do right now.
If someone has died, this page is for you. Five steps, honest timeframes, and one number that reaches a person — not a menu — at any hour.
What happens, and when
01
Now
Call us
Any hour, any night. We'll ask their name, where they are, and whether a doctor or nurse has been. That's all you need to know to make this call.
02
Within 90 minutes
We come to you
Home, hospital, hospice or care facility — two of us come, the same night, and bring the person who has died into our care with no fuss and no rush.
03
Day 1–2
We sit down together
The arrangement meeting, here or at your kitchen table, about an hour. You leave with a written figure and nothing signed unless you want it signed.
04
Day 2–4
Papers, permits, notices
We file the death registration, secure every permit, and draft any notices — you approve them, we place them. You will not visit an office.
05
Day 5–9
The service
Most families hold the service five to nine days after a death. Ellen runs the day; you carry nothing but yourselves.
What happens when you call at 2am
The house line rings in the office and, after 9pm, at the duty director's home — a Merriden, not an answering service. You'll hear a person who has done this for decades and is glad you called.
If you'd rather gather yourself first, write instead — we reply within one business day, and nobody will ring you back uninvited.
Pre-planning, without the sales pitch
Recording your wishes costs nothing and obliges you to nothing. Pre-paying, if you choose to, locks today's figure in writing and puts the money in a state-regulated trust — never in our accounts.
Either way, your family's job on the day shrinks to one phone call, and the person on the other end already knows what you wanted.
- Step oneTell us what you want — over tea here, or over the phone. About forty minutes.
- Step twoWe write it up as one plain page and post you the copy. Change it whenever you like.
- Step threeIf you pre-pay, the figure is locked and the funds sit in trust in your name.
One number, one address, no menu
Visit
41 Chapel Green Road, Fairview
Office 8:30am–5pm Mon–Sat · phone answered day and night