If someone has died
What we need from you, and what can wait
There are two lists on this page, and the difference between them matters more than either one. A handful of things on the telephone tonight. Everything else in daylight, with somebody sitting beside you.
Why there are two lists and not one
The first list is what we ask on the telephone, in the first minutes, so that somebody can come out. It is short because a long list at four in the morning is a list nobody reads.
The second list is not really our list at all. It is a form the city holds, and the questions on it are its questions rather than ours. Going through them is the first thing that happens when we sit down with you: Not about the arrangements. Where they were born, what they did, who is left. It fills the certificate and it tells us who we are looking after.
Nothing on either list has to come out of your head. A document, a drawer, another relative who remembers, a telephone call back an hour later — all of that counts, and none of it is a failure.
On the first call
This is the whole of it. We do not ask about burial or cremation on this call, we do not ask about a day, and there is nothing on it to decide.
What we ask tonight
Four things, asked in the order below and then done with. Everything else waits.
The person's full legal name
As it appears on official documents, including any middle name.
Where they are now
The hospital, the address, or the name of the facility.
Who you are to them
So we know at the start whether the law puts the decision in your hands or somebody else's.
A telephone number for you
One that will be answered in the morning.
In the morning, for the death certificate
Longer, duller, and none of it urgent. Whoever takes the arrangement meeting works through it with you in order and writes it down as you go, so it is a conversation rather than a form to fill in.
What the certificate asks for
Eight more. Every one of them is a box on a form somebody else designed, which is why some of them make no sense until you see them written down.
Date and place of birth
The town and the country, for the death certificate.
Their parents' names
Including their mother's name before marriage. This is the one that catches families out.
Social Security number
For the certificate and for notifying the federal government.
Marital status
And the surviving spouse's name, if there is one.
Occupation and industry
Even if they retired thirty years ago. The certificate asks.
Level of education
The certificate asks this too, and nobody expects it.
Military service
If they served, the discharge papers unlock several things at no cost.
Clothing
Something to dress them in, if there is to be a viewing.
The two that catch every family out
Neither is anybody's fault, and neither is a reason to put the meeting off.
Their parents' names
The one that matters is the mother's name before marriage, and it is a generation further back than most people have ever had reason to go. A cousin or an old document usually settles it in an afternoon.
Level of education
There is no version of this question that sounds relevant on the day after a death, and nobody expects it. It is on the form, so it gets asked, and an approximate answer is an ordinary one to give.
If neither is known, say so rather than guessing. There is usually somebody in the family who remembers, and finding out is a better use of an afternoon than most of what people do in that week.
Before you start worrying about it
Nobody is expected to know all of this from memory
It is fine to ring back. It is fine to ring back twice. It is fine to arrive at the meeting with half of it and find the rest afterwards.
Nobody remembers all of it
More than one person, if you can. Nobody should do this alone and nobody remembers all of it.
Nobody is hurried
If you feel hurried in the arrangement meeting, say so. If it happens again, go somewhere else.
What to bring to the arrangement meeting
Not much, and none of it is worth hunting for tonight. These are the ones that change what is possible rather than merely what is written down.
- Clothing. Something to dress them in, if there is to be a viewing. What a viewing involves.
- The discharge papers. The single most useful piece of paper in this whole process. If they cannot be found, they can be requested, but that takes weeks and it will hold up a national cemetery burial. What follows from them.
- Any pre-arrangement already on file. Made here or at another funeral home, in whatever form it exists. It does not bind you to anything, and it is the fastest way to stop a family guessing. Planning ahead.
- An insurance policy, if the family knows of one. A policy can usually be assigned to pay the funeral home directly, which means a family does not have to find the money and wait for the claim. Whether an insurer will do it, and how quickly, varies enormously. Paying for it.
If the person served, find the discharge papers before anything else. Several entitlements follow from them, most of them at no cost, and a great many families never claim them.
What these lists are for
Each one leads somewhere, and none of the pages below has to be read before the meeting.
- The arrangement meeting — Usually the day after the death, in daylight, and it takes about ninety minutes.
- Who has the authority to decide — which of you the law asks to sign, and why that is worth settling before the meeting rather than during it.
- The paperwork, in order — every filing, in the order it happens, and which of them are ours and which belong to somebody else.
- Death certificates — how many certified copies to order, and who keeps each one.
If something on either list cannot be found
Ring and say which one it is. A gap in the information is an ordinary thing to work around; a family searching a house at four in the morning is not.