AFCCA Membership and Supplier Partners Dues Increase

As announced at the AFCCA Annual Conference Member’s Meeting, the AFCCA Board of Directors voted during the March 9 meeting to increase membership dues effective January 1, 2024. AFCCA’s expenses have increased dramatically over the past few years. In the past five years, we have had a 45% increase in expenses. This is due to increases in prices of services we utilize, the cost of running events such as the conference, and wage increases for contractors. …

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Congress Takes Significant Step to Regulate Body Brokers

The Consensual Donation and Research Integrity Act would protect the dignity of donors and offer peace of mind to families. With the introduction of the Consensual Donation and Research Integrity Act (S. 2191/H.R. 4275), Congress took a vital step toward bringing necessary minimum standards to the largely unregulated process of whole body donation. The National Funeral Directors Association (NFDA) thanks Sens. Chris Murphy (D-CT) and Thom Tillis (R-NC) and Reps. Gus Bilirakis (R-FL) and Lizzie …

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The ROI of Funeral Aftercare: What are the benefits?

BY INTERNATIONAL GRIEF INSTITUTE When a 15-year-old girl died in a car crash in 2009, her family logically turned to the funeral home to help. After all, the funeral home is where every grief journey starts. Yet, aside from a small collection of old books, the fourth-generation funeral home, the largest in the county, offered nothing. The family was shocked. It was as if they had walked through an inferno, suffered third degree burns, remained …

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Choose Your Own Adventure at the 2023 NFDA International Convention & Expo in Las Vegas

Embalming and slots? Business skills and the great outdoors? Las Vegas is known for having it all and, no matter what your interests, you can choose your own adventure at the 2023 National Funeral Directors Association (NFDA) International Convention & Expo. Taking place September 10-13 (one month earlier than usual) in Las Vegas, Nevada, attendees can customize their NFDA Convention experience by choosing adventures to help them learn, grow, connect and return home refreshed, ready …

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Consumer Scam Alert

According to several NFDA members, scammers are at it again, this time targeting families you may have served recently. Using recently published obituaries, the scammer, posing as a member of you staff, calls families and tells them they owe another sum of money for the service or for graveside liability insurance. These scammers are even going as far as changing their caller ID listing to match or look similar to your Funeral Home Name when …

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AFCCA Advocacy Updates May 15 – SB1210

Yesterday, SB1210 passed unanimously out of the House. Prior to the vote, the bill was amended on the floor to include all of the amendments that we negotiated with the sponsor, and at this point all of our concerns have been addressed.  The most current version of the bill, that includes all of the amendments, can be viewed here— https://www.azleg.gov/legtext/56leg/1R/bills/SB1210H.pdf. Since the bill was amended in the House, it will have to receive a final vote …

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AFCCA Advocacy Updates May 11 – SB1210

Today, May 11, Jake Hinman from AZ Capitol Consulting gave a report to the Board of Directors on SB1210, which has come come a really long way from where we started almost 18 months ago. With the upcoming amendment, everything w we have asked for is put back in the bill: Education requirements Testing requirement Requirement to embalm 25 bodies to receive embalmer license Requirement to  arrange 25 funerals to receive Funeral Director license. The …

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AFCCA Advocacy Updates March 27 – SB1210

Today, March 27, several stakeholders met to discuss SB1210. In this meeting was bill sponsor, Senator Steve Kaiser, as well as Senator Anna Hernandez and Representative Cesar Aguilar, members from the State Board of Funeral Directors & Embalmers, Representation from Arizona Department of Health & Human Services, plus many members of the Funeral Profession and finally, several policy writers, researchers and representation from the  joint legislative budget committee. We felt it was a very productive …

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AFCCA Advocacy Updates March 21 – SB1210

SB1210 passed out of House Commerce Committee this afternoon, March 21, with party line votes (all Republicans supported and all democrats opposed). There was a floor amendment offered by Rep. Aguilar to continue the Board for one additional year. The amendment is what we call a “strike-everything amendment” where all of the text on the underlying bill would be struck and replaced with the new language. The amendment failed as all of the Republicans opposed. …

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Debriefing in the Funeral Home: An effective tool to de-stress

While speaking at an event for funeral service professionals, I asked, “How do you de-stress after a difficult call?” A participant’s hand went up, “I go shopping.” Another hand went up, “I listen to heavy metal music.” ” src=”cid:image005.png@01D94C35.2E971050″ alt=”” align=”right” hspace=”12″ v:shapes=”Picture_x0020_2″ class=”Apple-web-attachment Singleton” style=”width: 2.3166in; height: 2.3166in; opacity: 1;”>No one else offered a personal strategy, which is not surprising. Historically, a funeral director’s role as last responder has gone largely unrecognized, with little …

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