An AI-use policy for a family-owned funeral home, with an obituary fact-check list

Families trust you with the hardest week of their lives. If anyone on your staff uses AI tools, a one-page policy protects that trust. This post gives you the sections to include, the decisions you need to make, and a fact-check list for AI-drafted obituaries.

Why write it down now

Three reasons.

First, AI is already in your industry's tools. Passare lists an obituary writer, a notetaker and four other AI features (Passare AI features, vendor page, Oct 2026). Afterword's assistant Grace won the National Funeral Directors Association (NFDA) Innovation Award in 2025 (NFDA, Oct 2025). Your staff will use these features whether or not you have rules.

Second, the risks are real. When The Washington Post tested an AI obituary tool, it invented details and wrapped them in florid prose, even when given specific facts (Futurism, Aug 2025). Skeptical coverage has run in Utah as well (Deseret News opinion, Aug 2025).

Third, your profession is already talking about it. NFDA's 2026 convention includes a workshop, "Harnessing AI in Funeral Service Communication," on using AI for obituaries, letters and correspondence "while keeping a human, authentic tone" (NFDA 2026 Monday agenda).

The policy, section by section

Keep it to one page. Here is what to cover.

1. What AI may be used for

List the approved uses. A sensible starting list:

• First drafts of routine business messages, such as reminders to certifier offices
• Internal summaries and task lists
• First drafts of family updates and obituaries, always reviewed (see section 4)

And the uses that are off limits:

• Prices, the General Price List, contracts and statements of goods and services. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) Funeral Rule governs your price disclosures, and the FTC's May 2026 renewal notice describes no amendments (Federal Register, May 2026).
• Anything a licensed director signs or files
• Pre-need sales conversations

2. What family information may go into which tools

This is the most important section. Decide:

• Which tools are approved. Name them. Prefer the AI built into your case software, or business accounts whose terms say your data is not used to train the AI model.
• What never goes into a general chat tool. Social Security numbers, medical details and cause of death, financial and insurance details, and anything about other family members that is not needed for the task.
• Personal phones and personal accounts. Not for case information. Ever.

3. Who approves what

• Business messages (for example to a physician's office): any trained staff member reviews and sends.
• Anything a family will read: a funeral director reads every word before it goes out.
• Obituaries: the family approves the final text.

Write down who approved each message that left the building. Your case software may already log this.

4. Obituary rules

• AI produces a first draft only, from the family's own words and the arrangement notes.
• No detail appears that the family did not give you.
• The director runs the fact-check list below before the family sees the draft.

5. Telling families

Decide your answer before a family asks, "Did a computer write this?" We suggest telling the truth: the first draft was prepared with help from software, and a director and the family shaped every word. In our view, finding out later is likely to upset a family more than being told.

6. Training and review

• Everyone who uses AI tools reads the policy and signs it.
• Review the policy once a year, and whenever you change case software.

The obituary fact-check list

Print this and keep it by the arrangement room. Before any AI draft goes to a family, check:

1. Names. Full name, nicknames, maiden name, spelled exactly as the family gave them.
2. Dates. Birth, death, marriage, service. Check each one against the case file.
3. Places. Birthplace, hometown, schools, employers, churches.
4. Relationships. Who preceded in death, who survives. Check every name and relationship against the family's list. This is where invented or missing names do the most harm.
5. Service details. Time, place, officiant, visitation hours, memorial donations.
6. Claims and adjectives. Delete any trait, hobby or achievement the family did not mention. If the family said "she loved her garden," the draft should not say "she was an award-winning gardener."
7. Tone. Read it aloud. Does it sound like the family, or like a greeting card? Plain is better than florid.
8. Family sign-off. The family approves the final text in writing or by email.

A sample opening

If a blank page is the hardest part, start with something like this and change it to sound like you:

"[Funeral home] cares for families at the hardest time of their lives. We may use software, including AI tools, to prepare first drafts and keep our paperwork on time. A person on our staff reviews everything before it leaves our office, a funeral director reads every word a family will see, and we never use AI to set prices or to sign or file any record. Family information goes only into the tools listed below, and only what a task needs."

Then list your approved tools by name, the information that never goes into them, and who approves what. Date it, and have each staff member sign below.

Keep it to one page

A long policy goes unread. One page, signed by each staff member, kept in the office and reviewed once a year, is a sensible goal for a family-owned home. If you want the template ready to fill in, we are happy to share one.

A good first step

If you would like help writing your policy or training your staff on the AI already in your case software, the free conversation with Lunan is a good place to begin. We will tell you what is worth doing and what is not. Start it here.