What to Do After a Loved One Dies

Quick answer

When a loved one dies, start with three calls: the right medical or emergency contact to make the death official, a funeral home to bring your person into care, and the family member who should not hear the news secondhand. Everything else — banks, benefits, insurance — belongs to the days that follow, not the first hours.

Over the first week, the work settles into a pattern: settle arrangements with the funeral home and ask what is due first, gather the important papers, order certified death certificates, start any life insurance claim, and notify Social Security and other agencies. If a final expense policy exists, call the agent or insurer early. It is the money designed for exactly these bills.

And breathe. Aside from those first calls, almost nothing must happen today. Funeral homes guide families through this every day, and no good decision in this process requires an exhausted person to make it instantly.

Day one: three calls, then rest

Who you call first depends on where the death happened. In hospice care, call the hospice nurse line — the team handles the official steps. In a hospital or nursing facility, the staff do. At home without hospice, call 911, and the responders will direct what happens next under local rules.

The second call is to a funeral home, which can arrange transport at any hour. If your loved one left instructions naming a provider — check the folder of important papers if one exists — use it. If not, a family member chooses; it is normal and acceptable to ask about basic prices before agreeing to anything.

The third call is human rather than procedural: the people who need to hear your voice. After that, day one is allowed to end. Accounts and agencies will keep until tomorrow. In the weeks ahead, be alert for strangers who read obituaries and call about fake debts or urgent “final paperwork” — our guide to final expense and funeral scams covers the warning signs.

Why one death certificate is never enough

Almost every institution that held a piece of your loved one's life will ask for its own certified copy of the death certificate: each life insurance company, banks, pension or retirement plans, the county for property matters, sometimes the motor vehicle office. Photocopies are usually refused for official purposes.

The funeral home typically orders certified copies for you from the state or county — ask them to order several at the start. Each certified copy carries a government fee that varies by state, and ordering extras up front is usually easier than requesting more later. When in doubt, count the institutions you can think of, then add a couple.

Keep the copies with a running notebook of who you called, what they asked for, and what you sent. That notebook becomes the family's shared memory during a week when nobody's own memory is at its best.

The first-week worklist, in a workable order

• Settle arrangements with the funeral home — Confirm burial or cremation, the service, and the schedule, guided by any written wishes. Ask for prices in writing and what portion is due before the service.
• Find the papers — Look for a will, insurance policies, prearrangement contracts, military discharge papers, and identification. Check desks, files, safes, and with anyone your loved one trusted.
• Order certified death certificates — Ask the funeral home to order several certified copies. Insurers, banks, and agencies each tend to want their own, and photocopies rarely satisfy them.
• Open the life insurance claim — Call the agent or insurance company as soon as a policy is found. Ask exactly what the claim requires, then return the claim form and certificate promptly.
• Notify Social Security and other programs — Funeral homes often report the death, but confirm it was done. Ask about survivor benefits and the lump-sum death payment while you are on the line, and contact the VA if your loved one was a veteran.
• Protect the practical things — Secure the home and car, arrange care for pets, collect or forward mail, and keep utilities and house insurance paid while everything gets sorted.
• Watch for strangers with claims — Treat surprise calls about debts, benefits, or fees with suspicion, especially right after the obituary runs. Verify everything through numbers you find yourself.
• Assign one record-keeper — One person keeps the notebook: calls made, dates, names, documents sent. It prevents duplicate work and gives the whole family one source of truth.

Filing the life insurance claim, start to finish

If you know a policy exists, the claim is straightforward. The beneficiary — the person named on the policy — contacts the agent or the insurance company. The insurer provides a claim form, and the beneficiary returns it with a certified death certificate. Once the file is complete, the insurer pays the beneficiary directly, often within days to a few weeks depending on the carrier and the claim. The money is the beneficiary's to use for the funeral home, travel, and the bills that will not wait. Some funeral homes also accept an assignment of part of the benefit at the family's request, which can reduce what must be paid up front — ask whether yours does.

If you only suspect a policy exists, hunt before you assume. Look through filing cabinets and mail for policy papers or premium notices, scan bank statements for recurring drafts to an insurance company, check email, and call any agent your loved one ever mentioned. Agencies can search their own records when a family calls with a name.

Speed mostly depends on the paperwork being complete and the beneficiary designation being current — which is why we encourage seniors to revisit how the beneficiary on a final expense policy is chosen while everyone is healthy.

Agencies to notify — and the help they may offer

Social Security comes first for most families. The funeral home often reports the death, but the family should confirm it was done. Survivors may have two different things available: monthly survivor benefits for those who qualify, and the one-time lump-sum death payment of $255 for an eligible surviving spouse or child. The $255 is not sent automatically — it must be claimed within the required time period, so ask about it when you call. It will not cover a funeral, but it is worth claiming; our guide to the Social Security death benefit explains who qualifies.

If your loved one served in the military, contact the VA. For deaths on or after October 1, 2025, the VA may pay up to $2,000 toward burial costs when the death is service-connected, or up to $1,002 plus a $1,002 plot allowance when it is not. The VA does not pay funeral home costs like the casket, embalming, or the service itself — the details and eligibility rules are covered in our overview of veterans burial benefits and final expense insurance.

Round out the list as it applies to your family: Medicare and any health insurer, pension plans and former employers, banks and credit card companies, and the post office. Take them one call at a time. This is a week's work, not a day's.

The size of the first bills — and what usually pays them

Families are often surprised by how early the money questions arrive. The National Funeral Directors Association's most recent study put the national median cost of a funeral with viewing and burial at $8,300 — about $9,995 once a burial vault, which most cemeteries require, is added. A funeral with cremation had a median cost of $6,280. Cemetery charges, a marker, flowers, and travel arrive on top of those figures.

Set against bills like that, Social Security's $255 is help, not a plan. This is the gap final expense life insurance exists to close: a benefit — commonly between $5,000 and $25,000 — paid directly to a person your loved one chose, arriving during the very week the bills do.

If you are reading this while walking a family through its first week, we are sorry for your loss, and we hope the list above makes the days a little more manageable. If you are reading it to spare your own family this scramble someday, that instinct is the whole reason planning ahead exists.

Keep reading: guides that answer the next question

• Does Social Security Pay for Funeral Expenses? The $255 Benefit - who qualifies for the one-time payment and how to claim it
• Veterans Burial Benefits and Final Expense Insurance - what the VA covers for a veteran's burial — and what it leaves out
• Final Expense and Funeral Scams: Protecting Seniors - the schemes that follow obituaries, and how families shut them down
• Burial vs. Cremation Costs in 2026 - the cost difference behind the biggest early decision

Sources: Social Security Administration — lump-sum death payment · VA.gov — Veterans burial allowance and transportation benefits · National Funeral Directors Association — median funeral cost statistics · Federal Trade Commission — Debts and Deceased Relatives