The Office of Fair Trading is to consult on regulations for funeral directors, Tynwald heard.
Responding to a question from Dr Alex Allinson, OFT chair Tim Glover said it plans to “monitor various sectors of commerce for compliance based on complaints, legislative developments, emerging trends, and regulatory best practice”.
He explained: “Funeral directors will be written to and then visited to establish if they are compliant with the necessary consumer protection law and the legislative principles of fair trading and best practice in the industry.”
At the conclusion of the consultation period, Mr Glover said consideration would be given to “options may include new regulation, voluntary compliance with a fair trading charter or continued compliance with the current legislative requirements”.
Dr Allinson said his question was not prompted by a need for “draconian regulation” but by the fact that “some of the peculiarities of the Isle of Man, with not having the same regulation across, is stopping various funeral directors here offering some of the prepayment plans that were available previously from UK providers”.
He asked the OFT to also examine the Scottish Government’s voluntary code of practice for funeral directors, which promotes transparency in published fees.