Public Aid Regulations regarding Pre-arranged Funerals

What some people refer to as Public Aid in Illinois is now the Department of Human Affairs.  A person can select the funeral including services and merchandise, place funds in trust or have the funeral funded with a life insurance policy or policies, and then, be eligible for assistance. 

Pettett Funeral Home will help you or your family member by pre-arranging a funeral of his or her choice and then by sending the information to the Department of Human Affairs office.

PLEASE CONTACT OUR FUNERAL HOME FIRST BEFORE GOING TO PUBLIC AID.

We can tell you some of the regulations, and help prepare some of the details that the Department of Human Affairs are going to need.

If funding a pre-arranged funeral with funds placed in trust:

    The funeral trust has to be an irrevocable trust to be incompliance with the Department of Human Affairs regulations.  This means that no one can cancel the trust account.  This is for you protection as well as for the Department of Human Affairs protection.

(Before this ruling, people may have made a pre-arrangement with a funeral home, got confirmation that the person was on Public Assistance, and then went to the funeral home and cancelled the contract. Then at the time of the person's death, there were no funds to pay for the funeral.)

    Pettett Funeral Home will give copies to the caseworker of the contract for the funeral and the statement of funeral goods and services selected.  Every year, the caseworker will need to verify the amount of funds in trust.  Once being accepted, the trust account and future interest that accumulates on the trust is considered an exempt asset to the person receiving assistance. However, each year there is a report that will need to be completed stating the assets of the individual and the total value of the funeral trust account.  You can call our funeral home and we will assist you in completing the information needed each year regarding the funeral trust account.

If a funding a pre-arranged funeral with an insurance policy or policies:

Public Aid has very specific regulations regarding insurance policies.  For example: a person can not have over $ 1500.00 cash value in insurance, however, an individual can  make an irrevocable ownership/beneficiary from the insurance company to fund the pre-arrangement, use an absolute assignment to secure that the funds will be paid to the funeral home at the time of death, or some insurance companies actually have their own forms that mean the requirements of the regulations.  So that an individual does not cash in the insurance that he or she may have paid on all their life.

Because there are so many variables, we can not cover all the details here on the website, but PLEASE call our funeral home and we will give you the informaiton that you need in advance.