August 2015

 
Welcome to the latest edition of the Institute Update
 

A very warm welcome to our newest members: Wendy Eastman, Ann Adlem, Johanna Wynne, Paul Bowen, Anne Cross, Olivia Burren, Patricia Wojnar, Nikki Williams and Melanie Miller-Wells.

I very much look forward to hopefully meeting you, and others who have joined the Institute over the past year, at our Annual Conference to be held at the Yarnfield Conference Centre, Stafford, from Friday 6th November to Sunday 8th November. As ever, our conference organiser has worked very hard to bring together an exciting, interesting and informative programme for the weekend ... plus all the usual entertainment for the lighter moments! The full programme and booking form should be flying into your inbox within the coming days. I do urge all our members to join us for some or all of the weekend, as I know that, above all else, the opportunity for our members to get together and talk professionally and informally is invaluable.

 
National Funeral Exhibition 2015

Some of you were able to introduce yourselves at the National Funeral Exhibition in June. As ever, this was a brilliant event, if a little exhausting for those who worked on stands during three very warm days. A big thank you to those members who did give their time to help 'man' the IoCF stand.

We were able to talk to a wide range of professionals, and also took the time to carry out a small survey on attitudes towards civil funerals and celebrants - the findings of which make interesting reading - you can read more here.

 
Membership matters
At the NFE, we encountered a number of independent celebrants or 'intending to become' celebrants who approached us to ask how they might join the IoCF and what training and qualification would be required. It was clear from talking to them that many of those who have been happy to work independently are now beginning to realise the need to be part of a recognised organisation such as the IoCF.

On that note, you may well have read a post on the forum from one of our well-respected members, Lynn Banham, reminding members, from her own harrowing experience, one benefit that the Institute can offer. We hope that many of you will never need our support in such a way as Lynn did but, as she mentioned in her post, she had received 'an unpleasant and unjustified set of accusations from a new celebrant' in her area. The situation was escalating rapidly, through no fault of Lynn's and totally beyond her control. Having the voice and reputation of the IoCF to respond on her behalf did help to bring the matter to a swift close and assured that Lynn's reputation and standing with her local funeral arrangers was undamaged. She asked that I share this with all our members as affirmation of the value of membership of the IoCF to provide 'back-up' and 'strength in numbers' in the profession should working independently suddenly make you feel left out on a limb.

 
Pre-plan funerals
Questions and suggestions from members about the logistics of creating 'pre-plan' ceremonies has prompted us to clarify a few admin points and think about how we can offer further support in this area, and we are delighted now to offer a storage service for pre-plan scripts. Full details on that below.

In a similar vein, there are times when members are unable to take the service they are committed to for reasons out of their control. I know that on these occasions, other IoCF members have willingly stepped in and taken the service in their place. Payment for this can only be arranged between the members concerned. In most cases, the initial celebrant will have already invoiced the FD the full fee amount and so it is up to them to 'pay' their stand-in an agreed amount for reading their script for them on the day - many members just keep it as a 'credit' for a time when they can reciprocate the other member when needed. However, if you do make a payment to a colleague in these circumstances, please note that neither of you should book the ceremony with the IoCF, as that would cause one funeral to become two separate ceremonies in our records.

 
All members included
Our Council consists of working celebrants elected from the body of the membership to act on your behalf. I make no apologies in mentioning again the fact that the council members take on the extra roles and responsibilities that come with the office in their own time, in addition to working full time. As a result, some things don't happen as quickly as we would hope, but be sure we are working on your behalf as often as we can.

That said, we have to acknowledge that it is your Institute, and we welcome input, suggestions and actions from every member. And on that front, we have to thank Padraic Cawley for his unceasing hard work in Ireland to support our increasing membership over there to feel part of the IoCF, whilst at the same time providing support for the way in which they work in their community. With Padraic's help, we are developing part of the website as a dedicated area for Irish members and, in doing so intend to work with our web designers to upgrade many area of our existing website.

One area of upgrade will definitely be to our members' resources page - we want to create more resources which members can use in their work. As mentioned in our last newsletter, following from the last Best Practice Day we are planning on creating a 'toolkit' - a bank of resources (poems, prayers from other religions, useful passages for difficult funerals, techniques for working with families etc.) for members. We need your input on this one. If you have a suggestion for the type of resource which would be useful or an actual contribution to make, please contact Christine Rose at christine.bunchofroses@yahoo.co.uk, with the subject line 'Toolkit'.

 
Best Practice Days
The Claret Centre at Buckden has been booked for two dates next year, so add the dates to your diary so as not to miss out: Saturday, 12th March and Saturday, 25th June.

Best Practice Days are specifically run for the members, by the members, and so we want to hear what suggestions you have for topics to be covered. Having a 'theme' for the day has worked well in the past and we'd like suggestions from you. Currently on the possibles list are 'Looking after ourselves'; 'Running your own celebrant business'; 'Funeral ceremonies for dual culture ceremonies and out of the ordinary services.

If you - alone or as part of a group - would like to organise a Best Practice Day, or work with the council in planning and organising them please do get in touch. Send all suggestions and comments to me at kemperpot@aol.com with the subject line Best Practice Days.

A reminder also that the forum is a brilliant place for you to sound out and share your suggestions about the Best Practice Days, useful resources or funeral ceremonies with other members. As ever, if you have a problem with access, do contact Barbara. As you sign in to either the members' area or the forum, set your computer to 'remember' you - you won't need to enter the details again.

 
The IoCF keeps going ...
...with your help and support, so thank you to those who have already renewed their subscription or checked that their direct debit is ongoing for the coming year. You will all have received your invoice for subscriptions for the coming year and so here is a gentle reminder to make any payments due as soon as possible, please.

Likewise, as a requirement of membership, all annual crematorium assessments were due to be returned to the office by 31st July and so if you haven't yet asked your crematorium manager or funeral director to do this for you, please make sure that your give them the form as soon as possible so they can return it to us at the earliest opportunity. (Barbara can supply a spare form should have mislaid yours).

 
New Image
Devising the script cover paper and new trifold leaflets has taken up much of the Council's time this month but we wanted to get them absolutely right. They will go on sale in the next couple of weeks - we hope you will agree that they present an appropriate updated image for the IoCF.

Best Wishes
Christine Ogden
 

 
Admin News

Who's who ... on your booking forms
Please could you ensure that all client titles are added to the booking forms (Mr/Mrs/Ms/Miss/Dr etc). Names such as Alex, Chris, Ashley, Sam etc could be male or female. Many Thanks.
 

Pre-Plan Funeral Storage
When arranging a pre-plan funeral ceremony where the service may take place a long time in the future, we suggest that you make sure that you are paid for the work that you have done at the time of the meeting. Thus you will write a script that is approved and charge your fee, less an amount that you feel is appropriate for not having delivered the actual ceremony. At such time when the ceremony takes place, you or another celebrant can then charge the remaining fee for taking the service.

We recommend that you leave a copy of the script with the family (they have paid for it after all) and perhaps lodge a further copy with the funeral director with whom they have made the rest of the pre-plan arrangements or with their solicitor (with their will). In this way, when the time comes, should you not be in a position to deliver the service, a copy of the script should always be available.

We can help
Following the suggestion of a member, we are now able to offer the facility to store pre-plan scripts at the Institute. Scripts will be stored electronically, with the permission of the family, to be released to the celebrant who created it or to another member, again with the family's permission, as required.

To take advantage of this, the process is quite straightforward:

• Book the ceremony as normal with Barbara and ask her to store it as a pre-plan.
• Provide the family with a letter which explains the script is stored with the Institute, and gives them the unique ceremony number to quote should they be the ones to ask for the script at a later date. This ensures that should you, for any reason, be unavailable at the time the funeral is required, they are guaranteed that another IoCF member will be contacted and they will still receive the same standard of delivery.

Please contact Barbara for more details.
 

IoCF Stationery
To order IoCF items, contact Barbara (barbara@iocf.org.uk).

Overprinted leaflets - 12p each
Business cards - a sliding scale dependent upon quantity
Headed Paper (50 sheets) - £6
Compliment Slips (50 slips) - £6
Zipped Writing Case - £20
Presentation Folder - £10

For additional ceremony products visit www.celebrantsupplies.co.uk - a 'trade only' site for celebrants.
 

Involving Children with Funerals
Child Bereavement UK are holding a half-day seminar on 7th October at Kemnal Park Cemetary in Chislehurst.

Details can be found here or on their website (www.childbereavementuk.org)
 

 
Training News

All courses are held by Civil Ceremonies, and full details can be found on the CCL website.

IoCF Members receive a 10% discount on course fees.

 
Level 4 Courses

Advanced Practice Tribute Writing Techniques - 6th October
Advanced Practice Voice and Delivery Skills for Funeral Celebrants - 7th October
Advanced Practice Child and Baby Funerals - 13th October
Advanced Practice Bereavement Interviews - 14th October

There are two sets of fees for the above courses depending on whether you are eligible to take the full qualification or just attend the one day course.

Full qualification: £220.50 + VAT (after discount)
(includes distance learning, assessment, registration and certification)
One day training without qualification: £121.50 + VAT (after discount)

 
Level 2 Course

Poetry and Readings for Funerals - 15th October

Full qualification: £139.50 + vat (after discount)
One day training without qualification: £99 + vat (after discount)

Fees include: external accreditation, OCN or NOCN assessment, registration and certificates (if full qualification taken), refreshments, lunch and full course materials.
 

 
Database Statistics

Here are the stats for March 2015.

Total number of booking forms logged: 694

 
2015 Diary Dates

 
And Finally ...

Congratulations to the following members who have reached another milestone in their work ranging from 50 to 2000 funerals (names are listed in no particular order):
Richard Wiseman, Janice Kirby, Rob Rowe, Catherine Holtom, Nicki Hallett, Margaret Price, Christine Ogden, Neil Hopkins, Jan Doyle, Jan Di Marco, Mandy Helsby, Sally Band, John Culling, Chris Howe, Geoff Wood and Jean Martindale.
 

And thank you for reading.
Barbara