Minnesota Session Laws - 1985, Regular Session

  

                         Laws of Minnesota 1985 

                         CHAPTER 95-S.F.No. 921 
           An act relating to consumer protection; regulating 
          prepayments of certain funeral and burial goods and 
          services; amending Minnesota Statutes 1984, section 
          149.11.  
BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF MINNESOTA: 
    Section 1.  Minnesota Statutes 1984, section 149.11, is 
amended to read: 
    149.11 [PREARRANGED FUNERAL PLANS; CONTRACTS; TRUST FUNDS.] 
    (a) When prior to the death of any person, he or someone in 
his behalf, that person or another enters into any transaction, 
makes a contract, or any series or combination of transactions 
or contracts with another person, partnership, association or 
corporation, other than an insurance company licensed to do 
business in the state of Minnesota, for or related to the 
disposition of his body, by the terms of which, certain personal 
property related to the funeral services or the burial, 
cremation, or other disposition of human remains will be 
delivered upon his death used upon the death of the person for 
whom the property is to be used, or when the professional 
services of a funeral director or embalmer will then be 
furnished, or both, then the total of all money so paid by the 
terms of such the transaction, contract or series or combination 
of transactions or contracts shall be held in trust for the 
purpose for which it has been paid until the obligation of the 
transaction, contract or series or combination of transactions 
or contracts is fulfilled according to its terms the death of 
the person for whose benefit the money was paid, or refunded to 
the person who made the payment or payments, upon his demand.  
Accruals of interest or dividends declared upon the sum of 
money so held in trust are subject to the same trust.  The 
person, partnership, association or corporation holding the 
money in trust shall inform the person on whose behalf the money 
is held that all money paid plus all accrued earnings will be 
held in trust until the death of that person or until a request 
for a refund is made if made prior to death. 
    The personal property shall include but not be limited to a 
casket, burial vault not interred in a grave, combination 
casket-vault or other receptacle not described in paragraph (b) 
for the internment, entombment, cremation, or other disposition 
of human remains.  
    (b) Nothing in this section shall prevent the sale and 
delivery of cemetery lots, graves, burial vaults preinterred in 
a grave, cremation urns, crypt spaces, niches, columbaria, or 
grave or lot markers or monuments before their use is required. 
Nothing in this section prevents the preconstruction sale of 
crypt spaces to be permanently installed.  
    (c) It is the intent of the legislature that the provisions 
of this section shall be construed as a limitation upon the 
manner in which a person or legal entity is permitted to accept 
funds in prepayment of funeral services to be performed in the 
future or in prepayment of funeral or burial goods to be used in 
connection with the funeral or final disposition of human 
remains.  It is further intended to allow members of the public 
to arrange and pay for funerals, final dispositions, funeral 
services, and funeral and burial goods for themselves and their 
families in advance of need while at the same time providing all 
possible safeguards so that the prepaid funds cannot be 
dissipated, whether intentionally or not, so as to be available 
for the payment of the services and goods selected. 
    Approved May 9, 1985