U.S. General Accounting Office
Survey of State Regulators - Regulation of Funeral Homes, Cemeteries, Crematories, Pre-Need Sales of Funeral Plans, and Third-Party Sellers of Funeral Goods (GAO-03-831SP)
Background
This document presents the results of GAO’s survey of
state regulators of the death care industry. To obtain the information on
licensing, enforcement, and consumer protection for each of the five death care industry
components within our scope - funeral homes, crematories, cemeteries, sellers of pre-need
funeral plans, and sellers of third-party funeral goods - we developed five Web-based
surveys. We sent these surveys to the state official(s) responsible for licensing and enforcement
of state regulations of the five death care industry components covered in our review. At times, this meant
sending surveys to a number of different officials or sending all five surveys to one official. Information
about accessing the survey was provided via e-mail for those officials identified as being the appropriate
contact for participating in the survey. The survey was activated on December 2, 2002
and it was available until March 7, 2003. To ensure security and data integrity,
we provided each official with a username and password that allowed him or her to
access and complete a questionnaire. We received responses from 48 states regarding
funeral homes, 46 states regarding crematories, 45 states regarding cemeteries, 44 states
regarding sellers of pre-need funeral plan sales, and 45 states regarding third party sales
of funeral or cemetery goods. The survey results were then stratified by state and we show the results
for the individual states that responded to the survey. Although respondents were asked to provide written
comments to open-ended questions, these responses are not provided. A more detailed discussion of our scope
and methodology and a discussion of the summary of the survey results are contained in our report entitled "Death
Care Industry: Regulation Varies Across States and by Industry Segments"
GAO-03-757. We conducted our survey work from
December 2, 2002 through March 7, 2003 in accordance with generally accepted government auditing standards.
 |
Instructions for Viewing this Survey
How to View The Surveys
- You can only view one survey at a time. To view a survey, click on the Table of Contents link located
in the lower right of this screen. To read to the bottom of the screen, you may need to use your scroll bar
on the right side of this screen.
- The first screen in each survey is an introduction and general information that was sent to and
viewed by recipients of the survey. There are no survey results to view on this screen.
This screen is for information only and you may by-pass it by clicking on Next located at the bottom of the
screen in the lower right.
- If a question was not applicable or a state did not respond, then an "X" does not appear in the table.
How to View the Responses for Each Question
- To view the state responses to each question, click on the question number (Links to survey questions will
look like this: 1. 2. 3., etc.).
- After viewing the responses to each question, click on the "x" in the upper right corner of your screen
to close that window and return to the questionnaire.
How to Return to a Page That You Previously Visited
- To return to the last screen you viewed, click the Previous button on the lower right corner of the screen.
- Click the Next button to retrace your steps and return to screens you viewed.
How to Make the Font Larger on Your Screen
- You can make the font larger by changing your browser setting. For example, on Internet Explorer you can
change the font size by going to View and selecting Text Size.
|
|