Why families choose direct cremation

Ten years ago a direct cremation was what happened when there was no family or no money. Now around a fifth of funerals in the UK are direct cremations, and the families choosing them are choosing deliberately. On the first call they usually tell us why without being asked, and the reasons fall into four. Cost is one of them, and it is rarely the first one mentioned.

Because it is what the person wanted

The commonest reason, and the easiest. More people now say, in a will or in a conversation, that they want no funeral: no fuss, no expense, no one standing in a crematorium chapel on a wet Tuesday. Some say it because they dislike ceremony, some because they do not want their family to spend the money, some because they have sat through funerals they hated. When a person has said it, the family’s question is whether to honour it, and the answer is nearly always yes. A direct cremation does exactly what was asked, and the family remains free to gather in whatever way they want afterwards.

Because the goodbye should not be a crematorium slot

A traditional funeral compresses everything into twenty or thirty minutes in a crematorium chapel, nine or ten days after the death, on a weekday, when the family is still in shock and the people who mattered may be in another country. Families who choose direct cremation often say that this is the part they wanted to avoid: not the goodbye, but the crematorium’s version of it. With the cremation done and the ashes home, they hold a memorial when they are ready, in a place that meant something, with everyone who should be there. Planning a memorial service after a direct cremation is written for that.

Because of the cost

A direct cremation costs about a third of a traditional funeral, £1,295 with us against a national average of over £4,000 for a basic funeral, and for many families that is the difference between a funeral they can pay for and a debt. There is nothing to be ashamed of in this reason. A person who was careful with money would not want their family to borrow for a hearse. How much does a direct cremation cost sets out what the figure buys, and what is the cheapest way to be cremated in the UK covers the routes for a family with less than that.

Because the family is small, scattered or far away

Sometimes there is no one to fill a chapel. An elderly person who outlived their friends; a family spread across three countries; a person whose relatives are estranged. A traditional funeral for four people in a chapel built for a hundred is a hard thing to sit through, and families in that position often find that a direct cremation, followed by a small gathering of their own, fits who they actually are. The gathering can be four people at a kitchen table with the urn between them, and that is a funeral too.

What it is not

It is not a decision to have no goodbye. The families who regret it are the ones who wanted to be present at the cremation itself and chose direct to save money; can you attend a direct cremation draws that line exactly. It is not less care for the person: the collection, the chapel of rest and the cremation are the same as in any funeral, and direct cremation step by step shows each of them. And it is not a choice the family has to defend to anyone.

If you are deciding

Is a direct cremation right for us is six questions to answer together, and direct cremation or a traditional funeral sets the two side by side on what each includes. Whichever way a family decides, the reason is theirs, and it is nearly always one of the four above.