Durban - Grieving families will have no defence against unscrupulous touting by funeral parlours who prey on them when they lose loved ones in hospital. That is thanks to a ruling by the National Consumer Commission which has rejected an application for a funeral ombudsman to oversee the industry‚ leaving the more than R4.5bn industry without a code of conduct and without limitations on touting for business. The Funeral Industry Regularity Authority (FIRA) has been lobbying to act as an ombudsman to prevent "atrocities" including undertakers paying commissions to hospitals‚ hospices and priests to secure bodies for them. "After FIRA’s draft industry code of conduct was published for public comment‚ the NCC learnt from comments it received that the applicant did not enjoy support from the industry‚ and the industry did not agree with the applicant on the contents of the FIRA’s draft code‚" National Consumer Commission spokesman Trevor Hattingh said on Thursday. The Funeral Federation...
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