JANUARY 16, 2013 BOARD MEETING
With the passage of the new law, the State Board must now issue regulations on courtesy card permits. Once that is done, it will enable Ohio funeral directors who want reciprocal courtesy card rights in Kentucky, Indiana or West Virginia to apply to those states for a permit.
2. Pennsylvania Licensing Law Lawsuit. The Judge’s decision to invalidate 11 of the 12 provisions of Pennsylvania’s licensing laws as unconstitutional has been appealed by the Pennsylvania Attorney General. Briefs, including an amicus brief filed by NFDA in support of Pennsylvania’s funeral home inspection and preparation room requirements, are now being submitted to the U.S. Third Circuit Court of Appeals and a decision is expected in the latter half of 2013. Ohio has three of the same funeral licensing requirements that were struck down as unconstitutional in Pennsylvania. The three provisions that were struck down are as follows:
The one provision of the law which the trial judge did uphold was the prohibition against any business other than a licensed funeral home from selling disposition services to the public. (Ohio, Pennsylvania and twenty-eight other states have this requirement).
OFDA will continue to monitor the appeal and report any updates.
3. HB 481 Changes to Cremation Forms. The changes that HB 481 makes in Ohio’s funeral licensing laws will take effect on March 22, 2013. Starting on that date, Ohio funeral homes should use a cremation authorization form that provides for the new identification provisions found in HB 481. That includes deleting from the form any certification by the funeral director of the identity of the decedent. Instead, the new form will include only a representation by the funeral home that the body has been identified in accordance with the statute. The form should also recite the new forms of identification recognized by HB 481 including identification by tattoos or other distinguishing marks or reliance on an identification made by a coroner. OFDA will have updated cremation authorization forms on its website prior to the March 22, 2013 effective date.
4. HB 481’s 48 Hour Embalming/Refrigeration Requirement. HB 481 also contains a new requirement that a dead body that is not buried, cremated, donated or shipped out of state within 48 hours of death must be embalmed or refrigerated at 40 degrees or less. Starting March 22, 2013, OFDA members may want to reference this new requirement on their GPLs. After the mandatory disclosure that informs consumers that embalming is not required by law except in certain, special cases, funeral homes could add information regarding this new law. For example, at the end of the mandatory disclosure that the Funeral Rule requires regarding embalming, OFDA members could add the following new sentence: “If final disposition of a dead body has not occurred within 48 hours of the time of death, Ohio law requires that the body be embalmed or refrigerated at 40 degrees or less.”
5. Western and Southern Insurance Issues. Several members have had problems with the Irrevocable Insurance Assignment forms used by Western and Southern Insurance Company (“W&S”). The form, which W&S mandates that funeral homes use, does not recognize guaranteed-price contracts nor the OFDA Addendum to Preneed Contract form by which Medicaid beneficiaries can direct that excess insurance funds be used to prepay burial space items for immediate family members. Scott Gilligan has written W&S and proposed changes to its Irrevocable Insurance Assignment form which will address these issues. We are still waiting to hear from W&S as to whether it will adopt those changes.
6. Federal Estate Tax. The fiscal cliff resolution that was reached by Congress on January 1, 2013 did result in permanent estate tax relief. The new law gives each individual a $5.12 million exclusion ($10.24 million for married couples) which is indexed for inflation. The estate tax rate for amounts above the exclusion was increased from 35% to 40%. However, with the large individual and married couple exclusions, the estate tax will not impact most funeral home owners or their families.