Query on death of friend

[XFool]

This is a curious situation.

A friend died at home over the Easter weekend. They were single and, AFAIK, have no family in the UK. I believe the only family are in the USA.
I contacted the coroner and registered my details. Quite a few people would be interested in attending the funeral, I have been trying to keep them informed.

I gather from the coroner's office that an executer has been appointed and, as I am not a relation, the coroner will not give me any information, though they have passed on my details to the executor. So far I have heard nothing and so none of the other interested parties have.

OK, something could still turn up and from tomorrow I will make a few enquiries myself. But I don't see what else I/we can do. Does anyone have any experience or advice?

TIA

[XFool]

Well it's more than a "curious" situation.

It now turns out that the funeral service has been and gone. Meaning myself, several other close and even longstanding friends who very much wanted to attend the service will be unable to. How can this happen?

I understand a group of people from his workplace (I was the person who originally told them of his death) and even some of his neighbours(?) were at the service. I had registered my details with the coroner's office on the first working day after the weekend - I had gone round to his house on Easter Sunday because he had not been answering his phone, that is when I learned of his death from the police in the car outside.

I have never been in this situation before and I am unsure exactly what lessons to learn from it. 'Don't trust anyone'? being possibly one. It's not my habit to be suspicious and distrusting but obviously, at least in this case, the 'normal channels' didn't work for some reason.

I am left trying to see if I can somehow get hold of copies of the Order of Service via the crematorium. Let's hope they at least are not going to go down the 'Need to Know' route.

[XFool]

After the initial shock, the question going through my mind now is: "Should I officially complain?" And if so, who to?

Any opinion, advice?

TIA

[XFool]

One of his longstanding friends, who was relying on me to keep them informed, has just emailed me to say they think I should complain.

Perhaps all this is a warning to anyone who finds themselves in the same situation. But, if you cannot rely on the authorities in such circumstances what are you supposed to do? Turn private dick, camp outside their house with a camera? Keep ringing up their employers? Doorstep the neighbours? Apparently YES.

[Pipsmum]

Poor you. Not a nice situation. My suggestion is to organise a pleasant event with those who didn't get to attend, and celebrate his life together in his honour. The church obviously didn't have many details either. The services tend to get read out in the Sunday services for funerals, so if you don't go, you don't get to know. Might be worth a word with the vicar and he might organise a special reading for you all if that would help.

[PaulBullet]

**** organise a pleasant event with those who didn't get to attend ****

This is excellent advise, my father in law did not have a funeral as such as he gave his body to medical science. The local church to me put on a lovely remembrance service and we had a great wake afterwards. To be honest the service was only put on for a few of his family who were religious, he wasn't and neither are his children so the wake would have been enough.

[chas49]

The coroner's job is to look into the circumstances of the death. As a public official, s/he can only deal with people who have a legal status in relation to the deceased. I would imagine it's only as a favour rather than a duty that they passed on your details to the executor.

So I don't think you can realistically complain to the coroner.

It's unfortunate that the executor didn't get in touch - but there's no obligation on him/her to do so - and they are a private individual and there's no legal way for you to complain to them either.

So (legally - as that's the focus of this board), I don't think there's much you can do.

As suggested already, maybe just organise an informal "wake" for any friends of the deceased who missed out...

[XFool]

Yes, thanks for the suggestions. I was thinking along similar lines myself. A parallel remembrance service and/or wake for his friends who missed out. I wonder how common this is?

Fortunately the crematorium have been more forthcoming, while they do not keep any papers themselves they have told me the name of the funeral director's (in the street where he worked) and I will try them tomorrow to see if they have any left or if they know where they were printed.

[XFool]

The coroner's job is to look into the circumstances of the death. As a public official, s/he can only deal with people who have a legal status in relation to the deceased. I would imagine it's only as a favour rather than a duty that they passed on your details to the executor.

So I don't think you can realistically complain to the coroner.

It's unfortunate that the executor didn't get in touch - but there's no obligation on him/her to do so - and they are a private individual and there's no legal way for you to complain to them either.

So (legally - as that's the focus of this board), I don't think there's much you can do.

As suggested already, maybe just organise an informal "wake" for any friends of the deceased who missed out...

But this is surely a pretty ordinary set of circumstances? People die. People die suddenly. People die at home. People die without relatives in the country. I would have expected (obviously wrongly) that there were pretty standard procedures in place for letting friends know what the arrangements are if there is no family known or contactable by them. Particularly if they register their full details for that express purpose. And if the coroner's office cannot do this why do they not fully explain the situation?

Somehow his workplace (and even neighbours) knew. Perhaps because they are an 'official body'? Very ironic, as I was one of the first people to learn of his death and the person who originally informed his workplace of his death.

If what you say is true then it means anyone who finds themselves in a similar situation would need to make a bit of a nuisance of themselves - phoning all the funeral directors in the area once a week, phoning the deceased's workplace at least once a week. If I had known I needed to do this then I would have done so. I didn't know I needed to...

[JonE]

But this is surely a pretty ordinary set of circumstances? People die. People die suddenly. People die at home. People die without relatives in the country. I would have expected (obviously wrongly) that there were pretty standard procedures in place for letting friends know what the arrangements are if there is no family known or contactable by them.

Given that the demise occurred at home (presumably owned rather than rented) and without identifiable kin then I believe the duty to dispose of the remains would fall to the executor (or equivalent) or, if there is none, to the local authority.

As the coroner's office was involved in this case, it may be required to issue certificates/orders but surely has no 'social' role in publishing whatever arrangements have been made - that'd be down to the executor(s) with whom they have contact and the executor(s) would be guided in that by the Will of the deceased with regard to disposal of remains and similar. Isn't that the 'standard procedure'?

Cheers!

[Lootman]

Given that the demise occurred at home (presumably owned rather than rented) and without identifiable kin then I believe the duty to dispose of the remains would fall to the executor (or equivalent) or, if there is none, to the local authority.

He said there were relatives alive but that they are not in the UK (and presumably do not wish to act).

In a case where there are relatives but those relatives refuse to organise the funeral then it can be a Catch-22 situation, especially if the deceased had assets,

The LA will only perform the funeral if there are no willing or able relatives and there are no assets. If there are assets then those assets should be used to fund the funeral.

In fact, in one situation that I was professionally involved with, I had to consult with the Crown Commissioners who told me that the only thing I could use the deceased's money for was the funeral. Otherwise it was frozen.

So I did.

[XFool]

I now know who the funeral directors were and also the executor, a solicitor, and have been in contact with both. The actual executor is away until next Tuesday and I will speak to her then. I know the executor was speaking to my friend's employers in the week following Easter.

Meanwhile a horrible possibility has started to loom in my mind. Could the fault be at my end? I left my full details, including landline number, with the coroner's office. If these were passed on to the executor they might have tried to contact me by landline, rather than email as I was expecting. The problem here is: my phone.

I have a dreadful BT branded Home Phone with Answering Machine. I have some plausible reason to believe that it is in the habit of deleting the next (unheard) recorded message rather than the last message heard. It may be I unknowillingly deleted a message from the executor. It will be difficult to establish if this happened, but I may know more when I speak to the solicitor on Tuesday.

It may be a case of: Wednesday morning, down to the council tip.

[XFool]

And the answer is...

There is no answer.

How can this be? This is the UK in 2018 not Occupied France, 1941. Somebody has died at home, apparently none of his friends know exactly when (I can narrow it down to a week), or the cause of death, or were notified of his funeral.

One person, I assume a neighbour, told the executors (who were appointed by the deceased). This person told the executors who his employers were, therefore they were the only people involved or told anything.

I was one of the first people to learn of his death, I informed friends who informed other friends. I was the first person who informed his employer. I registered my details with the coroner's office, who originally led me to believe I would be informed of the funeral arrangements. I was then going to inform everybody else, but I was never told anything. So neither were any of his friends.

I was unaware of the executor, I was not known to the neighbour, I was not known to the executor. The executor tells me the coroner would not have passed on any information and they had none about me. There were no family in this country.

Is this 'normal' in the UK?

[staffordian]

The current state of affairs sounds harsh, but in practice, how could what you wish for actually happen?

Most deaths occur to people with family of some sort who make all the arrangements and let friends and family know, and it's usually just word of mouth, so even in this ideal situation, inevitably some don't get to hear.

Unless there was a centralised process for initial death notification, it's hard to envisage anything that would ensure everyone who wishes to know of a death gets to know.

And even with a centralised system, would you want to hear about every death, and if not how would you ensure you got to hear about the ones you were interested in?

I see no answer, unfortunately.

[Chrysalis]

I can believe it, as data protection laws trump common sense these days.
I’ve been concluding, as I reflect on my elderly parents’ final years, that friends don’t have the status that family have, and if you don’t have any family you are in contact with your death and final years can be very lonely.

I think the lesson we can take from this is that if you have a professional executor and no family, you should include a letter with your will giving details of anyone you would like to be informed of your death. When my second parent died, I went through their address book and informed everyone in it who I could reach of their death. (luckily they had such a thing, these days most people’s contacts will be inaccessible on a computer or phone). If I hadn’t done that, those people wouldn’t have known. So a lot depends on having next of kin who care for you.

I am sorry for this sad tale. I hope you and the other friends of your friend can hold your own memorial.

[Chrysalis]

Actually thinking about this again, data protection doesn’t apply to dead people. So actually there was no reason why the executor or the coroner couldn’t have made contact with you. But because these people were acting in a professional and not a personal capacity, I guess they perhaps didn’t feel they could or should.
If only your friend had appointed a friend as one of his executors.

[XFool]

The current state of affairs sounds harsh, but in practice, how could what you wish for actually happen?

Well, by me being told. Either directly by the coroner's office telling me, as I was led to expect, or by the coroner's office telling me the body had been released and telling me who the executors were, or via the executors, as the coroner's office had passing my details on to them.

The guy who originally emailed me from the coroner's office sent an internal email, asking for my details to be 'added to the notes' and thanking 'everyone'. What's the point of this if there is no point in this?

I assumed the coroner would have passed on my details to the executors and so I would have heard. Indeed, on a followup email from me to the coroner's office - after the funeral, but little did I know - I was told (by another person) they would (then?) pass my details to the executor who would inform me if they chose to.

Unless there was a centralised process for initial death notification, it's hard to envisage anything that would ensure everyone who wishes to know of a death gets to know.

I would have assumed that is what normal procedures would lead to, otherwise why bother with the coroners? It was the police who told me to contact them. It seemed to make sense at the time.

Surely somebody somewhere in the system must realise that ordinary people off the street are hardly familiar with all the legal procedures and limitations? Although a death at home with no family in the country is likely unusual it is surely not unprecedented?

[swill453]

I was unaware of the executor, I was not known to the neighbour, I was not known to the executor. The executor tells me the coroner would not have passed on any information and they had none about me.

This bit doesn't ring quite true. What executor would know that a "coroner would not have passed on any information"? Is the executor so knowledgeable about coroner's practices?

It's probably simple cockup. The coroner (or staff of) meant to pass your details on to the executor but screwed up. There's probably no legal obligation on them to do so, so probably little point in complaining.

Scott.

[staffordian]

The current state of affairs sounds harsh, but in practice, how could what you wish for actually happen?

Well, by me being told. Either directly by the coroner's office telling me, as I was led to expect, or by the coroner's office telling me the body had been released and telling me who the executors were, or via the executors, as the coroner's office had passing my details on to them.

The guy who originally emailed me from the coroner's office sent an internal email, asking for my details to be 'added to the notes' and thanking 'everyone'. What's the point of this if there is no point in this?

I assumed the coroner would have passed on my details to the executors and so I would have heard. Indeed, on a followup email from me to the coroner's office - after the funeral, but little did I know - I was told (by another person) they would (then?) pass my details to the executor who would inform me if they chose to.

Unless there was a centralised process for initial death notification, it's hard to envisage anything that would ensure everyone who wishes to know of a death gets to know.

I would have assumed that is what normal procedures would lead to, otherwise why bother with the coroners? It was the police who told me to contact them. It seemed to make sense at the time.

Surely somebody somewhere in the system must realise that ordinary people off the street are hardly familiar with all the legal procedures and limitations? Although a death at home with no family in the country is likely unusual it is surely not unprecedented?

I agree the system seems to have let you down here, but I'm thinking wider than this specific case, or to look at this case in a slightly different way, how would you, or the coroner, or anyone else be able to ensure others who knew him well and might have wished to attend the funeral knew about it?

Had things played out slightly differently, I guess it might easily have been the case that the first you heard of the death was well after the funeral had taken place...

[XFool]

It's probably simple cockup. The coroner (or staff of) meant to pass your details on to the executor but screwed up. There's probably no legal obligation on them to do so, so probably little point in complaining.

Scott.

That's what I'm thinking. My first followup email to the coroner's office, to add some possible information but also as a prompt, was to the personal internal email address of the man who originally replied to me. I heard nothing from him. My later, second followup email, was to the admin address and was answered by somebody else.