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facilities The use of appropriate End-of-Life resources can help to create a respectful atmosphere in a hospital or community facility when someone has died. These include the End-of-Life Symbol, keepsake pouches, family handover bags, mortuary trolley drapes and bedside lockers. More information on these resources can be found at HFH Resources - Irish Hospice Foundation. 12. Resources to support communication in end-of-life care When communicating with a deceased person’s relatives and friends it is important to: · Treat bereaved relatives and friends with kindness and compassion. · Acknowledge the extra stress that the pandemic is creating for them. · Give them the opportunity to ask questions. · Gently guide them towards useful information and sources of support (see section 9). The HSE National Healthcare Communication Programme includes guidance on how to conduct difficult conversations (/healthcare-communication/nhcp-guidance-for-difficult-conversations.pdf). Irish Hospice Foundation’s “Toolkit for Compassionate End-of-Life Care” provides advice for healthcare workers when communicating with deceased people’s relatives and friends. It is available. 1 Implications of the COVID-19 Pandemic for the Funeral Director Market and the CMA Investigation 1.1 Introduction Europe Economics has been asked by the National Association of Funeral Directors to analyse implications of the COVID-19 pandemic for the CMA’s market investigation. In this paper we cover: • Impacts of the pandemic on firms’ costs, revenues and price recovery. • Impacts on consumers and the market more generally such as entry and competition. • Features of the market which have been brought into sharper focus during the pandemic. • Implications of the above for the CMA’s market investigation and remedies. Our paper focuses on the restrictions imposed throughout the UK as a result of the lockdown announced 23 March 2020. For the funerals sector this has meant funerals limited to immediate close family with no church services, arrangements made online or over the phone, and the application of social distancing across many areas of the business. These restrictions have led to a range of changes for firms and consumers. Whilst some restrictions have been eased during June and may continue to be so over the coming months, our analysis remains relevant for a number of reasons. First, the impacts of the restrictions will have lasting effects on some funeral directors, for example forcing them to change business models, change their size or scope of practice, or exit the market. Second, the restrictions will have changed the way the market (including consumers) operates in many areas, which may be sustained over the near and long term. In addition, the impacts of the restrictions have highlighted aspects of the funeral director market which previously may not have been clearly observed, which will have implications for the analysis undertaken and remedies proposed by the CMA. And finally, the situation with the pandemic continues to evolve – at the time of writing many funeral directors are still operating in the same way as under full lockdown, and it is possible that subsequent lockdown periods may be imposed in the UK. In preparing this paper we held focus groups with nine independent funeral directors (not including any large corporates) of different sizes across different regions of the UK. We note that this research, while limited in scope, provides useful insights into the ways in which the pandemic can impact businesses. There have been some positive developments during this time – in particular reports of simpler paperwork as driven by government regulations and increased electronic administration. However, there have been negative impacts for many such as falling revenues, increasing (or static) costs, regulatory arbitrage and concerns over cost recovery. 1.2 Impacts on funeral directors’ costs, revenues, pricing and competition 1.2.1 Falling average revenues The COVID-19 pandemic and associated restrictions have driven a number of changes in the revenues funeral directors are able to earn. Implications of the COVID-19 Pandemic for the Funeral Director Market and the CMA Investigation - 2 - Social distancing requirements and restrictions on the numbers permitted to attend a funeral have led to more consumers purchasing simpler funerals. Examples include no or very scaled-down services either at the graveside or at the crematorium, no wakes (where the deceased remains at the family home for people to pay their respects), no viewings at the funeral home (e.g. where viewing chapels are too small to safely accommodate viewers within social distancing guidelines), fewer flowers and orders of service/other stationery purchased, fewer added extras such as elaborate caskets, and no limousine transport. There has also been an increase in the number of direct cremations (with no mourners at all). The price that funeral directors charge for the simpler funerals is typically much lower than for standard funerals. This includes the erosion of important margins that funeral directors are able to make on optional extras. Whilst these changes are not the same across the board – for example in some areas, families compensate for not hiring limousines by having more flowers or a more elaborate coffin – most of
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