Published on: 18th March 2024

Expressing your funeral wishes

On your passing, funeral arrangements will need to be made and you can decide on your preference. A Will is the perfect place to express your wishes for the arrangements. They are called “wishes” because they are not legally binding.

Your executor has many duties ~ one of which is to arrange your funeral according to your wishes. It is therefore important that you discuss this with your executor and close family to avoid alternative arrangements being made.

Funeral wishes are not legally binding on your executor but normally your executor will follow your wishes. In the event of a dispute of the arrangements, it is for the executor to decide. This also applies if there have been no funeral wishes made.

To prevent any confusion, make sure you express your wishes through a Will and discuss the arrangements with family and your executor. We also recommend that you leave a letter of your detailed wishes stored with, but not attached to, your Will. Your letter of detailed wishes can record all the arrangements you want including music etc: If you have your Will stored with us at Casey & Associates then the letter of detailed wishes should be stored with, but not attached, to your Will and you can leave a copy with your personal papers and a further copy with your executor. Always make sure that your executor has the latest version so that they can follow your wishes and avoid the chance of a dispute arising. You can change the information in your letter of detailed wishes at any time without the need to change your Will saving the cost of an amendment fee.  

If you would like to speak with one of our Consultants to discuss any of the issues raised in this article or any other Estate Planning topic please telephone 01732 868190 or click here.

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If you wish to give instructions or require general information about our Wills, Lasting Powers of Attorney, or Trusts then we will carry out a telephone or Zoom appointment.

However, if you wish to give instructions to one of our Consultants and you feel that you can only do this at a Face to Face meeting then we are offering, at our Consultant’s discretion, a limited number of Face to Face appointments in most of the areas we normally cover. To see the areas we normally cover please click here.

To arrange an appointment please telephone 01732 868190 or click here.

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