Philadelphia Crematories, Inc.

About Us History of Cremation Cremation FAQs Memorialization Products and Services Selecting a Crematory Online Client Services

Authorization Forms and Price Lists Third Party Crematory Due Diligence Picture of the Month Contact Us

Philadelphia Crematories, Inc.
7350 State Road
Philadelphia, PA 19136
215-708-7747 (telephone)

Why Crematory Due Diligence?
Bill Sucharski, Philadelphia Crematories, Inc.

Cremation procedures pose the largest source of risk exposure and liability in the funeral service industry. When using a third-party crematory, funeral homes have a legally binding responsibility to the family to ensure that the cremation will be carried out in a legal, professional, and ethical manner.

Legal precedent from recent lawsuits in Georgia and New Hampshire point out that “funeral directors can be held liable for the actions (or inactions) of their independent third-party crematory contractors if the funeral directors have not practiced due diligence”.
- Robert Smalley
(Lead counsel for the plaintiff’s class-action lawsuit against the Tri-State Crematory and the funeral homes that recommended and used it.)

Tri-State’s insurer paid $80 million and the 56 funeral homes that used Tri-State paid out over $36 million in damages last year on this case. One firm paid over $8 million. Legal fees ran $50,000-$200,000 per firm. Some of the firms had no liability insurance.

Our latest industry scandal is in Seabrook, New Hampshire. At Bayview Crematory, on Feb. 23, 2005, authorities discovered:

12 sets of unlabeled, unidentified urns filled with cremated human remains
A commingled cremation in progress (1 adult and a 23 month fetus in the same cremation unit at the same time)
The decomposing body of a 50 year old woman left in a broken refrigeration unit for 7-10 days
A dumpster outside the crematory filled with charred pacemakers, hip replacements, prosthetics, and casket hardware
Incomplete and forged documentation regarding cremation permits and authorizations

A 10-count class-action lawsuit (over 4000 families have had loved ones cremated at Bayview since it opened in 1999) was filed in Boston U.S. District Court on September 21, 2005 against Bayview Crematory, its owners, and the funeral homes and cremation societies that used Bayview.

Statements from the lawsuit claiming funeral home liability include:

“Motivated by greed, the funeral home defendants utilized the services of the ‘low-cost’ Bayview Crematory, which was ‘well-known throughout the industry’ as a ‘shoddy’ operator.”

“The funeral home defendants, in order to either save the small sum of approximately $75 per deceased body, entrusted the remains of the loved ones of plaintiffs and other class members to Bayview Crematory even though that meant that the funeral home defendants had to turn over control of bodies under their charge to an operation that did not meet reasonable current industry standards.”

“The failure of each and every funeral home defendant to discharge its duty of special care to ensure that the remains entrusted to their care were handled respectfully and in accordance with the wishes of the families of the deceased contributed to and caused harm to the plaintiffs and the class. Had any one of the funeral home defendants inspected, supervised or monitored Bayview Crematory’s cremation practices, as this special duty requires, Bayview Crematory’s practices would have been discovered and stopped before widespread injury took place” (emphasis added).

“The funeral home defendants are responsible (emphasis added) for the atrocities that occurred at Bayview Crematory because they knew, or recklessly and/or negligently disregarded, the disrespectful way that Bayview Crematory treated the remains of the loved ones of plaintiffs and the class.”

Funeral homes using Bayview Crematory paid about 30% less than competing crematories charged and Bayview provided a free pick-up and delivery service. This amounted to about a $75-125 savings per cremation.

The payout for these 4000 families is projected to be about $50,000-75,000 each - amounting to approximately a $200-300 million total.

These settlements send a strong message of validation to attorneys nationwide that there is a growing market (and already a few proven templates) for suing funeral homes that do not practice basic oversight due diligence. This will also have a real impact on the entire funeral industry’s ability to get affordable professional liability coverage.

Therefore, The Current Reasonable Standard Of Professional And Legal Accountability Regarding Cremation Has Once Again Been Raised.

Robert Smalley’s recommends that funeral directors simply need to:

Sincerely pay as much attention to the $1300 cremation as the traditional $6000 burial
Practice prudent risk management through unannounced inspections of third party crematories

“If you document your efforts, you will be much less likely to make an attractive defendant.”

Protect families and protect yourself. Recommended due diligence packages have been made available from CANA, BACP, ICFA, NFDA and some cremation providers like PCI since as far back as February of 2004. Failure to use one, at this point, will be deemed irresponsible and negligent by a court of law. Change is inevitable. We all must adapt to this evolution in our industry. A casual, cavalier attitude toward proper cremation due-diligence today is simply too dangerous. It exposes us all to disastrous liability. Don’t let a few dollars or a few minutes keep you from doing what is right. Attaining proper procedures and documentation may cause some initial inconvenience for some, but it will ensure that we all are safeguarded. And as an industry, we are constantly doing our best to uphold the legal and ethical trust that families are placing in us when they choose cremation.

The following information is what we at Philadelphia Crematories, Inc. provide for our customers. It is a good example of what you should expect from your third-party crematory. This comprehensive, four part, fact-finding exercise documents:

Funeral Home Internal Policy
Requested Crematory Records
Crematory Interview Questions
Crematory Inspections

Enclosed, you will find parts II and III completed by PCI for your due diligence file. All that you still need to do is document your internal FH policies and procedures regarding proper authorization, identification, transportation, etc. (see enclosed part I), and perform at least one unannounced crematory inspection per year.

Making this good faith effort is what is reasonably expected by the cremation families you serve, your industry officials, and your insurance carrier. Proper collection and documentation of this information is vital to limiting your liability in the event of litigation.

PCI delivers comprehensive, quality responses for your due diligence package regarding crematory policies, procedures, staff and facility – standards unmatched by any other local crematory. We are proud to provide our industry and the families served with complete confidence. We vow to maintain and improve upon these standards and practices as long as you – our funeral home customers – allow us the opportunity.

This site requires