Professional Service Charges

We are pleased to provide you with a full disclosure of our professional service charges.

To help you understand funeral costs we have prepared an outline of the categories that make up a funeral account. There are basically four sections that make up a funeral account: casket & merchandise selections, professional service charges, cash disbursements and taxes on applicable items.

To help consumers, legislation states that all funeral homes must provide an itemized price list of all of their related professional service charges as well as casket and merchandise charges. This list must be available at the consumers' request without cost or obligation.

We pride ourselves on always being one of the most reasonably priced funeral homes in the area, although many expect our charges to be much higher given our level of professionalism, the quality of our facilities and our ethical standards. Consumers and families finally can learn first hand that there is a difference in the service we provide and they do not need to fall into the trap of traditional loyalty many funeral homes attempt to count on. Today, being good is not good enough. We trust that this service will give you one more reason to give the Smith Funeral & Cremation Services of Athens serious consideration when seeking a funeral home that is pro-actively working towards providing you the highest standards of services and facilities while offering sensible and affordable solutions.

Casket & Merchandise Selections

This section is specific to the casket that a family selects. All of our caskets and merchandise is priced separately - meaning the price you see for the casket is for the casket itself with no other items included. This can often become confusing to families. Some of the other types of merchandise you might find in these section of the funeral account are: burial vaults, cremation urns, and upgraded stationary packages. Again, each is itemized based on your selection and a total is itemized under the "Casket & Merchandise Selections." As always, you are free to purchase or acquire these items from any other funeral home or other source. Receiving funeral homes cannot charge any handling or administration fees when a casket is purchased elsewhere.

Cash Disbursements

Cash disbursements are just as they imply: to aid the families we serve, we will cover third party expenses and place them on our account as a convenience until the estate is understood.

Strict legislation ensures that these items are not marked up and only the exact "cost" is included on the funeral account. Typical cash disbursements might include:

• Newspaper Notices
• Clergy Honorariums
• Cemetery Charges
• Coroner's Cremation Certificates
• Reception Catering