This is a copy of the letter I gave to the owner of the Cornell:
I am writing to inform you of how utterly disgusted and appalled I am at the service and treatment of my family during my brother's funeral arrangements. During the service, one of your staff was sitting in an office texting on his phone with the door wide open for everyone to see. Another staff who was supposed to be opening the door for visitors was only doing so less than half the time. In addition to this total lack of respect, during the planning of the service, you provided very little assistance. I asked if you had a sound system in the funeral home that we could play our music on. You offered a CD player. I asked if you had a table that we could place some of my brother's belongings on. You asked me, with a discerning tone, "how much stuff are you planning on bringing?". For almost $6000, I would have expected a much higher quality of service.
I could have overlooked all of this had it not been for the fact that you called my mother three days after the service to let her know that her son's body is just now being taken for cremation after sitting in the funeral home all weekend. To add to that, you reminded her about the payment for your "service". My mother was just starting to heal and get her strength back, but after your phone call, she is back to being as completely devastated as she was the day my brother died. I'm failing to understand how another human being can be so heartless and cruel during one of the most difficult moments in a person's life.
I will be delivering the down payment for your horrible service in person. I also have a question about your casket policy. We were told that you could not rent caskets anymore even though my brother wasn't getting buried in his and it was only for display at the service. So we bought one of your $2000 caskets. I would like to know what you do with all of those extra caskets that people purchase when their family members are cremated. Since we paid for it, I would like to keep ours and I would like to pick it up when I deliver your payment.
This is a re-cap of the response I got:
I went to Cornell Memorial Home today to deliver my letter. The owner and his one staff opened the letter and read it. They were SMIRKING and SNICKERING while reading the letter and the owner shot me a disgusted look when he read the part about me wanting the casket. He grunted and said, "of course we cremated it with him."
His staff told me that he was the one who did not want to give our friend a second card because they were running out and he said "I was not rude to her". I let him know that other people saw their confrontation and he continued arguing with me. I'm sorry, but you have been snickering and smirking at me for the past 5 minutes, I'm sure you were just as rude to her if not more. And...what do you mean you were running out??? I got the numbers wrong in my last note, it was actually $8000 not $6000 for my brother's service. For $8000, you couldn't have made more than enough cards for our guests???
I also brought up the other issues we had, such as the staff who was texting in an office with the door open, which I personally witnessed, and the other staff who was trying to chat with my friend about baseball while he was waiting in line. The owner and his staff did not say a word about it. They shrugged and shot us another smirk!!!
This is a FUNERAL HOME that is treating people this way. I just lost my brother last week and you are grunting and snickering at me? I was honestly expecting an apology. A sincere apology along with the assurance that behavior like this would never happen again. I absolutely didn't expect them to be so snotty and rude to us. As the owner handed me the bill, he pointed out that they gave us a $250 professional discount, whatever that means. Wow, thanks. So I asked him why, for $8000, they couldn't have at least provided a better sound system than a CD player. His response was (in a demeaning tone), "you said you were going to handle the music". YES, I said that because you told me all you had was a CD player!
I have contacted the National Funeral Director's Association and they were very helpful, saying that would do everything they could to help. I also emailed letters to the editor at both The News Times and The Housatonic Times. I'm completely shocked that they are continuing to be so nasty to people who have just lost a family member and I am doing everything in my power to make sure this does not happen again. read more