UK mourners choosing simpler funerals in COVID crisis - Dignity

(Reuters) - UK funeral services group Dignity said on Monday families burying loved ones in the COVID-19 pandemic were opting for simpler services as it reported a rise in the overall number of deaths compared to last year and a drop in profits.

The group, reporting on results for its operations to the end of March, also pointed to uncertainties over how and when families would hold funerals and knock-on effects from the crisis on the numbers of deaths in coming years.

It said as a result of those and other factors it would not be providing financial forecasts at this time.

The British government has provided guidance on how funeral services should be conducted in its ongoing coronavirus lockdown, including limiting the number of people present to immediate family members and close friends.

Dignity said it had also stopped providing church services or limousines for mourners, significantly reducing its average charge for full service funerals.

"In April...the proportion of clients choosing a simple funeral compared to a full service funeral has increased dramatically to approximately 60%, compared to the 20% seen in the first quarter," the company said.

Memorial sales also started to decline in March, it said, as legislation required crematoria to close their grounds to people unless they were attending a cremation service.

The company said it would not speculate on future numbers of deaths, but said they had increased by about 1% to 161,000 compared to last year.

"Should 2020 witness a large number of incremental deaths, beyond the 600,000 originally anticipated by the Office for National Statistics, then it is possible that 2021 and 2022 could experience a lower number of deaths than in 2019," it said.

Underlying revenue rose 2% to 83.1 million pounds for the quarter ended March 27.

The company was currently achieving an overall weighted average income per funeral before ancillary revenues of about 2,200 pounds in April, compared to 2,648 pounds achieved in the first quarter ended March 27.

Dignity has not furloughed any employees and does not intend to approach the government for direct financial support beyond business rates relief, it said.

Shares in the company fell 4.3% to 224 pence in early trade, the biggest loser on the FTSE small cap inde

(Reporting by Tanishaa Nadkar in Bengaluru; Editing by Devika Syamnath and Patrick Graham)