Are you open on Public Holidays?

One of us is always available on the phone, any day or time, including public holidays. So, in a way, we’re always open, whether it’s Waitangi Day, ANZAC Day, Easter, Matariki, Christmas or just Tuesday.

Sometimes people are surprised when we answer the phone in the middle of the night or first thing on a Sunday morning. We don’t use a call centre or answering service – it’s just us. The only time you’ll be speaking to a robot is if we can’t answer the phone for some reason, like if we’re driving, in a meeting with another family or on another call. You’ll be invited to leave a message with your name and number and we’ll get back to you as soon as we can. That’s usually within a few minutes.

Our office is open mainly by appointment, all year round. This gives us more flexibility with how we work, rather than having to make sure there’s always someone in the office 9-5. If you happen to drop by, you may find the door is locked – give us a call and we can make a time to meet.

What happens on public holidays

We’re very used to looking after people on days when other services are shut down. We can still transfer a deceased person into our care, undertake care-of-body, viewings, arrangement meetings and suchlike.

However, there may be other aspects of funeral care that will be slowed down a bit.

In some retirement villages there may be an on-call doctor or Registered Nurse who can provide the necessary medical paperwork but their rounds may not be due for some hours. We’ll probably have to wait until the next working day to contact your preferred venue, which means a delay in being able to confirm a venue, date and time for a service. Cemetery offices are usually closed on Sundays and public holidays and while we can usually make a booking we will have to wait until the next working day before it can be confirmed.

We’ll do everything we can to keep things moving for you over the public holiday or weekend, and to keep you up to date as bookings are confirmed.

Can I have a funeral on a public holiday or a weekend?

Wellington City Council and Porirua City Council will provide cremation or burial on Saturdays and some Public Holidays (but not Sundays). A weekend or Public Holiday service will incur extra fees – you can review those on their websites:

• Karori cremation fees
• Makara burial fees
• Whenua Tapu fees

Most venues, celebrants, caterers and other suppliers will also charge a public holiday fee. This is to cover the usual cost of teams or their staff working on a public holiday. For a service on a Public Holiday or weekend we add about $360 to our Professional Service fee, in line with FDANZ guidelines.

See also: Someone has died. What should I do?