2016 Legislative Update for the
Burial Services Program
The Tennessee General Assembly has recently made changes to statutes which may impact you as a holder of a registration with the Burial Services Program. Pursuant to Tenn. Code. Ann. § 4-3-1306(d), you are receiving this notice because you have elected to receive notification by e-mail of certain changes or potential changes to the law applicable to your profession. These new changes set out in the following Public Chapters specifically amend the Tennessee Code Annotated as follows:
Public Chapter 838, clarifies that a cemetery owner may not charge for any service not performed except that the cemetery owner may charge an administrative processing or documentation fee in an amount not to exceed one hundred dollars ($100) per agreement or transaction. This Act takes effect on July 1, 2016. A copy of the new law is available for review on the website of the Tennessee Secretary of State here: http://share.tn.gov/sos/acts/109/pub/pc0838.pdf.
Public Chapter 911, defines funeral merchandise for pre-paid funeral merchandise, allows the Commissioner to issue a contract that must be used for funeral and cemetery pre-need contracts that include funeral merchandise, replaces the definition of “merchandise” with a definition for “cemetery merchandise” in the Cemetery Act, and requires a seller providing both cemetery and funeral merchandise on a single contract to pay only one consumer protection fee. This Act took effect on April 27, 2016 for the purpose of promulgating rules and will take effect on January 1, 2017 for all other purposes. A copy of the new law is available for review on the website of the Tennessee Secretary of State here: http://share.tn.gov/sos/acts/109/pub/pc0911.pdf.
If you have any questions or concerns about these new laws, please contact us by email at reg.boards@tn.gov.
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