How to become Funeral Attendant in 2024

Funeral Attendant Perform a variety of tasks during funeral, such as placing casket in parlor or chapel prior to service, arranging floral offerings or lights around casket, directing or escorting mourners, closing casket, and issuing and storing funeral equipment.

Funeral Attendant is Also Know as

In different settings, Funeral Attendant is titled as

  • Crematory Operator
  • Funeral Assistant
  • Funeral Attendant
  • Funeral Greeter
  • Funeral Home Assistant
  • Funeral Home Associate
  • Funeral Home Attendant

Education and Training of Funeral Attendant

Funeral Attendant is categorized in Job Zone Two: Some Preparation Needed

Experience Required for Funeral Attendant

Some previous work-related skill, knowledge, or experience is usually needed. For example, a teller would benefit from experience working directly with the public.

Education Required for Funeral Attendant

These occupations usually require a high school diploma.

Degrees Related to Funeral Attendant

Training Required for Funeral Attendant

Employees in these occupations need anywhere from a few months to one year of working with experienced employees. A recognized apprenticeship program may be associated with these occupations.

Related Ocuupations

Some Ocuupations related to Funeral Attendant in different industries are

What Do Funeral Attendant do?

  • Perform a variety of tasks during funerals to assist funeral directors and to ensure that services run smoothly and as planned.
  • Greet people at the funeral home.
  • Offer assistance to mourners as they enter or exit limousines.
  • Close caskets at appropriate point in services.
  • Obtain burial permits and register deaths.
  • Direct or escort mourners to parlors or chapels in which wakes or funerals are being held.
  • Place caskets in parlors or chapels prior to wakes or funerals.
  • Clean and drive funeral vehicles, such as cars or hearses, in funeral processions.
  • Carry flowers to hearses or limousines for transportation to places of interment.
  • Clean funeral parlors or chapels.
  • Arrange floral offerings or lights around caskets.
  • Provide advice to mourners on how to make charitable donations in honor of the deceased.
  • Issue and store funeral equipment.
  • Assist with cremations and the processing and packaging of cremated remains.
  • Act as pallbearers.
  • Transport the deceased to the funeral home.
  • Attend to the needs of the bereaved, such as by offering comfort, counseling, or after-care programs.
  • Perform various administrative tasks, such as typing documents or answering telephone calls.
  • Supervise funeral processions and assist with cemetery parking.
  • Deliver floral arrangements or other items to family members of the deceased.
  • Perform general maintenance tasks for funeral homes, such as maintaining equipment or caring for funeral grounds.
  • Embalm, dress, cosmeticize, and casket the deceased.
  • Manage funeral home finances, including receiving payments, making bank deposits, or performing general bookkeeping duties.
  • Obtain doctors' signatures on death certificate and complete other paperwork, such as insurance claims forms.
  • Meet with family members to plan the funeral.
  • Prepare obituaries for newspapers.

Qualities of Good Funeral Attendant

  • Oral Comprehension: The ability to listen to and understand information and ideas presented through spoken words and sentences.
  • Oral Expression: The ability to communicate information and ideas in speaking so others will understand.
  • Speech Clarity: The ability to speak clearly so others can understand you.
  • Speech Recognition: The ability to identify and understand the speech of another person.
  • Written Comprehension: The ability to read and understand information and ideas presented in writing.
  • Near Vision: The ability to see details at close range (within a few feet of the observer).
  • Static Strength: The ability to exert maximum muscle force to lift, push, pull, or carry objects.
  • Problem Sensitivity: The ability to tell when something is wrong or is likely to go wrong. It does not involve solving the problem, only recognizing that there is a problem.
  • Deductive Reasoning: The ability to apply general rules to specific problems to produce answers that make sense.
  • Inductive Reasoning: The ability to combine pieces of information to form general rules or conclusions (includes finding a relationship among seemingly unrelated events).
  • Information Ordering: The ability to arrange things or actions in a certain order or pattern according to a specific rule or set of rules (e.g., patterns of numbers, letters, words, pictures, mathematical operations).
  • Written Expression: The ability to communicate information and ideas in writing so others will understand.
  • Trunk Strength: The ability to use your abdominal and lower back muscles to support part of the body repeatedly or continuously over time without "giving out" or fatiguing.
  • Far Vision: The ability to see details at a distance.
  • Multilimb Coordination: The ability to coordinate two or more limbs (for example, two arms, two legs, or one leg and one arm) while sitting, standing, or lying down. It does not involve performing the activities while the whole body is in motion.
  • Selective Attention: The ability to concentrate on a task over a period of time without being distracted.
  • Visualization: The ability to imagine how something will look after it is moved around or when its parts are moved or rearranged.
  • Time Sharing: The ability to shift back and forth between two or more activities or sources of information (such as speech, sounds, touch, or other sources).
  • Arm-Hand Steadiness: The ability to keep your hand and arm steady while moving your arm or while holding your arm and hand in one position.
  • Category Flexibility: The ability to generate or use different sets of rules for combining or grouping things in different ways.
  • Originality: The ability to come up with unusual or clever ideas about a given topic or situation, or to develop creative ways to solve a problem.
  • Gross Body Coordination: The ability to coordinate the movement of your arms, legs, and torso together when the whole body is in motion.
  • Stamina: The ability to exert yourself physically over long periods of time without getting winded or out of breath.
  • Dynamic Strength: The ability to exert muscle force repeatedly or continuously over time. This involves muscular endurance and resistance to muscle fatigue.
  • Depth Perception: The ability to judge which of several objects is closer or farther away from you, or to judge the distance between you and an object.
  • Fluency of Ideas: The ability to come up with a number of ideas about a topic (the number of ideas is important, not their quality, correctness, or creativity).
  • Control Precision: The ability to quickly and repeatedly adjust the controls of a machine or a vehicle to exact positions.
  • Manual Dexterity: The ability to quickly move your hand, your hand together with your arm, or your two hands to grasp, manipulate, or assemble objects.
  • Visual Color Discrimination: The ability to match or detect differences between colors, including shades of color and brightness.
  • Spatial Orientation: The ability to know your location in relation to the environment or to know where other objects are in relation to you.
  • Memorization: The ability to remember information such as words, numbers, pictures, and procedures.
  • Finger Dexterity: The ability to make precisely coordinated movements of the fingers of one or both hands to grasp, manipulate, or assemble very small objects.
  • Speed of Limb Movement: The ability to quickly move the arms and legs.
  • Number Facility: The ability to add, subtract, multiply, or divide quickly and correctly.
  • Mathematical Reasoning: The ability to choose the right mathematical methods or formulas to solve a problem.
  • Perceptual Speed: The ability to quickly and accurately compare similarities and differences among sets of letters, numbers, objects, pictures, or patterns. The things to be compared may be presented at the same time or one after the other. This ability also includes comparing a presented object with a remembered object.
  • Extent Flexibility: The ability to bend, stretch, twist, or reach with your body, arms, and/or legs.
  • Flexibility of Closure: The ability to identify or detect a known pattern (a figure, object, word, or sound) that is hidden in other distracting material.
  • Auditory Attention: The ability to focus on a single source of sound in the presence of other distracting sounds.
  • Speed of Closure: The ability to quickly make sense of, combine, and organize information into meaningful patterns.
  • Reaction Time: The ability to quickly respond (with the hand, finger, or foot) to a signal (sound, light, picture) when it appears.
  • Rate Control: The ability to time your movements or the movement of a piece of equipment in anticipation of changes in the speed and/or direction of a moving object or scene.
  • Night Vision: The ability to see under low-light conditions.
  • Glare Sensitivity: The ability to see objects in the presence of a glare or bright lighting.
  • Hearing Sensitivity: The ability to detect or tell the differences between sounds that vary in pitch and loudness.
  • Sound Localization: The ability to tell the direction from which a sound originated.
  • Response Orientation: The ability to choose quickly between two or more movements in response to two or more different signals (lights, sounds, pictures). It includes the speed with which the correct response is started with the hand, foot, or other body part.
  • Gross Body Equilibrium: The ability to keep or regain your body balance or stay upright when in an unstable position.
  • Peripheral Vision: The ability to see objects or movement of objects to one's side when the eyes are looking ahead.
  • Wrist-Finger Speed: The ability to make fast, simple, repeated movements of the fingers, hands, and wrists.
  • Dynamic Flexibility: The ability to quickly and repeatedly bend, stretch, twist, or reach out with your body, arms, and/or legs.
  • Explosive Strength: The ability to use short bursts of muscle force to propel oneself (as in jumping or sprinting), or to throw an object.

Tools Used by Funeral Attendant

  • Body bridges
  • Casket carriages
  • Casket lowering devices
  • Compaction tampers
  • Cremation stands
  • Dump trailers
  • Funeral church trucks
  • Hearses
  • Mausoleum lifts
  • Monument lifts
  • Mortuary bier pins
  • Mortuary cots
  • Mortuary dressing tables
  • Mortuary lift systems
  • Mortuary operating tables
  • Mortuary roller systems
  • Mortuary vans
  • Numbering machines
  • Pallbearer casket carriages
  • Passenger vehicles
  • Vault lowering devices

Technology Skills required for Funeral Attendant

  • Bookkeeping software
  • iCIMS Talent Cloud software
  • Microsoft Excel
  • Microsoft Office software
  • Microsoft Word