Centralising registration of wills could ease burden

MY SISTER Nosive passed away on April 4; she was a kind, funny person who had only just celebrated her 39th birthday. It was a horrible shock for the whole family and, in the following days, we were all together on WhatsApp group conversations and conference calls trying to come to terms with her sudden illness and death.

- NKOSIKHULULE NYEMBEZI

Luckily, we are a close family and quickly agreed on how to prepare for the funeral and handle her affairs. She had died without a will and still had our late mother as a beneficiary in her bank funeral insurance policy. So, we asked one of our younger brothers, Bonginkosi, to submit a claim as an interested party and administer the funeral insurance payout. We knew we could knock about R6,000 off the funeral bill if we contacted our cousin's funeral parlour and arranged for the repatriation of the body from Sunday Valley Hospital ourselves, so I volunteered to do that.

And, I must say, the quality of customer service you get when you are newly bereaved is a revelation. We bypassed the recorded voices and infuriating phone menus and only spoke to real people almost straight away, who all were falling over themselves to offer condolences and make the funeral preparation process easy and painless.