New Arkansas Insurance Commissioner Allen Kerr has been a busy man since taking over the post as part of Gov. Asa Hutchinson’s administration.
That’s included fielding a lot of calls and questions about Arkansas Funeral Care in Jacksonville.
Kerr, in a news release this afternoon, said
the Arkansas Insurance Department has fielded approximately 700 calls in just four days from consumers with concerns and questions about prepaid funeral benefits contracts they have with Arkansas Funeral Care, LLC of Jacksonville, Arkansas. Following the funeral home’s surrender of its license to the Arkansas State Board of Embalmers and Funeral Directors on January 23, 2015, Kerr signed an order suspending the funeral home’s permit to provide funeral services and funeral merchandise in prepaid funeral benefits contracts, often referred to as pre-need contracts or plans.
“My staff is responding to this volume of calls as quickly as possible,” said Kerr. “I appreciate your patience as we go through the records we seized on Monday. The Department is taking a methodical approach to its investigation prior to the hearing which is scheduled for February 11, 2015. I am confident any consumer who calls the Department about this matter will receive a call back,” Kerr stated.
Kerr said the department doesn’t think any of the prepaid policies are in jeopardy. He said families with claims on or before Feb. 11 should contact the department’s Prepaid Funeral Benefits staff for help in finding a substitute funeral provider.
Arkansas Business reported on Jan. 16 about a complaint filed against the funeral home by a former empoyee who alleged “blatant disregard for the dead” at the business.
The Arkansas State Board of Embalmers & Funeral Directors later voted for an emergency suspension of the funeral home’s licenses and the license of its manager, LeRoy Wood, after an inspector testified that she was “taken aback” by the conditions under which bodies were being held.
Earlier this week, the Insurance Department also suspended the funeral home’s permit to provide the pre-need contracts. And of course the lawsuit have begun.