A LEADING undertaker fears pre-paid funeral plans could turn into the next financial mis-selling scandal.

Stephen Tapper, joint managing director of Poole-based Tapper Funeral Services, claims many people buy from salespeople without knowing how much of their money will be eaten up by commission and charges.

And he says many of the plans will not end up paying for the kind of funeral people expect.

The plans he is concerned about involve customers paying into a trust fund, rather than directly to a funeral director, in order to cover the cost of their funeral.

But Mr Tapper said so much was taken out in fees and charges that the jobs would go to funeral directors who were prepared to conduct “60p in the pound” funerals.

“Funeral plans are not a bad thing per se. They started with funeral directors selling them to their own prospective clients but they’ve been sold increasingly aggressively, with charities getting on the bandwagon and some financial institutions,” he said.

“Everyone’s trying to get on the bandwagon and they’re being sold by literally anyone – including sales people in shopping centres.”

Hundreds of pounds could disappear in charges by the time the customer died, Mr Tapper warned.

“Then they will offer that funeral to a funeral director who will have to undertake to carry it out at a price,” he added.

He said this could mean some funerals being conducted by non-local undertakers because they were the only ones willing to take on the work.

Other funerals could be taken on by directors who would seek to preserve their profit margins – for example, by fitting as many funerals as possible into one day.

“The funeral director is going to chop out certain things to still make money,” he said.

He said money paid directly to a funeral director for a pre-paid plan was better protected and regulated.

His concerns were shared by Douch Family Funeral Directors of Dorset, which also runs its own plan.

Managing director Nick Douch said: “There are other products on the market that give a bad name to funeral plans – they are often sold by people on commission who have no interest in the customer. All our plans are administered by our own staff and from our own branches.”