New research from Citizens Advice Scotland has found that many bereaved Scots are finding it hard to pay the growing costs of burying their loved ones.
This report shows that as funeral costs have been rising over the past ten years a postcode lottery has developed in regard to burial and cremation fees across Scotland’s Local Authorities. Our research has found that there is four times the difference between the cheapest and most expensive places to be buried in Scotland.
We have also found that the price of cremations can vary substantially and one local authority charges are more than a private sector crematorium. These findings come as rising number of clients are coming to their local Citizens Advice Bureau (CAB) for support with struggling to pay for funeral costs. Across the CAB network there has been a 27% increase in the number of funeral cases in the last year.
Many of these cases highlight the either people taking debt to pay funeral costs or struggling to piece together money to pay for the most basic of services.