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...you can't kick the crap out of grieving relatives the way you could out of ordinary customers. I mean, you COULD, and maybe even SHOULD in some cases, but in all honesty, we all know who would get painted with the asshole brush in that kind of exchange.
I write free obituaries. Now, except for rare cases, these free obits have to come to us from a funeral home so that we know that the person we're getting actually existed and is dead (we get way too many pranksters trying to sneak in fake "I.C. Weiner" obits otherwise). And basically, so far as the obit, he who pays, plays...so the person handling the arrangements for the funeral home gets to dictate the free obit. See, the thing is, nothing shows off the ugly, nasty parts of a family quite like a death in it. The best way we figured out to keep from getting dragged into the middle of it was to institute this policy for our free format. (Nothing stops the other members of the family from taking out ad space to run their obit, if they're really that set on it.)
So, incidentally, when a change needs to get made to the obit, we have to hear it through the funeral home. Any old human can call and say "I'm the mother of ____, and this needs to be changed." Granted, this is mostly to cover our own asses, but it's also for the protection of the family who put in the obit. No one wants to spend their time constructing one of these and have somebody else swoop in and undercut them. And since the funeral home knows who's paying and who's the family, and I don't, I let them run interference. They're good at it.
Sometimes, like just now, you get one who just can't grasp that. A woman called me regarding a teenager's obituary, saying she was the mother and they had a change that needed to be made. Now, I don't know this woman from a hole in the ground, so I tell her what she needs to do (very politely, this is a grieving woman after all, if she is who she says she is).
You'd think I had done something most heinous.
Her: "This is my daughter, I wrote this! I just need this correction made!"
Me: "Yes ma'am, I understand that, but you need to contact the funeral home and have the correction made through them because-,"
Her: "But I'm her mother! I wrote this!"
Me: "Yes ma'am, but you have to go through the funeral home to make a correction be-,"
Her: "I'M THE MOTHER." (Irritated human side-note, she's actually the stepmother, but I know stepmoms can be just like real moms. I was just thinking a little bit hateful of her at this point and my brain was being spiteful.)
Me: "Yes ma'am, but it's a concern of our's-,"
Her: "I WROTE THIS!"
Me: "Is this going to be a paid obituary?" (Paid obits don't have to come through a funeral home...so long as we get paid and it's not illegal, we don't care who puts what.)
Her: "No, it's free!"
Me: "Okay, well...for the free ones, we need to get any clarification through the funeral home because-,"
Her: "GOD!"
Me: "-otherwise anyone could call in and say they were a relative and try to make changes to an obituary, so-,"
Her: "So you're saying I'm a liar!"
Me: I'm not saying you're a liar, but you do have to go through the funeral home-,"
Her: "I AM HER MOTHER!"
Me: "Ma'am-,"
Her: "I WROTE IT!"
Me: "And you just need to call the funeral home and have them contact us with the correction. It would probably only require a phone call."
Her: "I don't be-LIEVE this!"
Me: ......(seriously, don't know what to say at this point...can't make it any clearer.)
Her: "I am her mother!"
Me: "And I'll need you to go through the funeral home so that we know-,"
Her: *super-sarcastic* "THANK YOU!" *hangs up*
The thing is, my customers are usually grieving relatives and it's not nice to pulverize them no matter how badly they deserve it...
I get a call a little while later from a lady downstairs, who has this same mother on her phone trying the same thing. We confer and I let downstairs lady know the obituary is free and repeat to her our policy so she can tell the mother, then we hang up. I don't know how long the mother kept calling around to people downstairs or wherever, but it was about half an hour later and actually AFTER deadline that the funeral home called me and let me know the family had JUST gotten back to them about the correction. The woman could have finished with me, called the funeral home, and had this all done within like, three minutes, but drug things out ten times longer calling a bunch of people who had no idea what to do, all because I dared to ask her to do something to protect herself and her daughter's obituary. *le sigh*
I write free obituaries. Now, except for rare cases, these free obits have to come to us from a funeral home so that we know that the person we're getting actually existed and is dead (we get way too many pranksters trying to sneak in fake "I.C. Weiner" obits otherwise). And basically, so far as the obit, he who pays, plays...so the person handling the arrangements for the funeral home gets to dictate the free obit. See, the thing is, nothing shows off the ugly, nasty parts of a family quite like a death in it. The best way we figured out to keep from getting dragged into the middle of it was to institute this policy for our free format. (Nothing stops the other members of the family from taking out ad space to run their obit, if they're really that set on it.)
So, incidentally, when a change needs to get made to the obit, we have to hear it through the funeral home. Any old human can call and say "I'm the mother of ____, and this needs to be changed." Granted, this is mostly to cover our own asses, but it's also for the protection of the family who put in the obit. No one wants to spend their time constructing one of these and have somebody else swoop in and undercut them. And since the funeral home knows who's paying and who's the family, and I don't, I let them run interference. They're good at it.
Sometimes, like just now, you get one who just can't grasp that. A woman called me regarding a teenager's obituary, saying she was the mother and they had a change that needed to be made. Now, I don't know this woman from a hole in the ground, so I tell her what she needs to do (very politely, this is a grieving woman after all, if she is who she says she is).
You'd think I had done something most heinous.
Her: "This is my daughter, I wrote this! I just need this correction made!"
Me: "Yes ma'am, I understand that, but you need to contact the funeral home and have the correction made through them because-,"
Her: "But I'm her mother! I wrote this!"
Me: "Yes ma'am, but you have to go through the funeral home to make a correction be-,"
Her: "I'M THE MOTHER." (Irritated human side-note, she's actually the stepmother, but I know stepmoms can be just like real moms. I was just thinking a little bit hateful of her at this point and my brain was being spiteful.)
Me: "Yes ma'am, but it's a concern of our's-,"
Her: "I WROTE THIS!"
Me: "Is this going to be a paid obituary?" (Paid obits don't have to come through a funeral home...so long as we get paid and it's not illegal, we don't care who puts what.)
Her: "No, it's free!"
Me: "Okay, well...for the free ones, we need to get any clarification through the funeral home because-,"
Her: "GOD!"
Me: "-otherwise anyone could call in and say they were a relative and try to make changes to an obituary, so-,"
Her: "So you're saying I'm a liar!"
Me: I'm not saying you're a liar, but you do have to go through the funeral home-,"
Her: "I AM HER MOTHER!"
Me: "Ma'am-,"
Her: "I WROTE IT!"
Me: "And you just need to call the funeral home and have them contact us with the correction. It would probably only require a phone call."
Her: "I don't be-LIEVE this!"
Me: ......(seriously, don't know what to say at this point...can't make it any clearer.)
Her: "I am her mother!"
Me: "And I'll need you to go through the funeral home so that we know-,"
Her: *super-sarcastic* "THANK YOU!" *hangs up*
The thing is, my customers are usually grieving relatives and it's not nice to pulverize them no matter how badly they deserve it...I get a call a little while later from a lady downstairs, who has this same mother on her phone trying the same thing. We confer and I let downstairs lady know the obituary is free and repeat to her our policy so she can tell the mother, then we hang up. I don't know how long the mother kept calling around to people downstairs or wherever, but it was about half an hour later and actually AFTER deadline that the funeral home called me and let me know the family had JUST gotten back to them about the correction. The woman could have finished with me, called the funeral home, and had this all done within like, three minutes, but drug things out ten times longer calling a bunch of people who had no idea what to do, all because I dared to ask her to do something to protect herself and her daughter's obituary. *le sigh*
My favorite obits ever.
She loved her grandkids and great-grandkids, and would've wanted them all to be listed.
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