16-301. Any agreement, contract or plan requiring the payment of money in a lump sum or installments which is made or entered into with any person, association, partnership, firm or corporation for the final disposition of a dead human body, or for funeral or burial services, or for the furnishing of personal property or funeral or burial merchandise, wherein the delivery of the personal property or the funeral or burial merchandise or the furnishing of services is not immediately required, is hereby declared to be against public policy and void, unless all money paid thereunder shall be deposited in a bank or savings and loan association which is authorized to do business in this state and insured by a federal agency, or invested in a credit union which is insured with an insurer or guarantee corporation as required under K.S.A. 17-2246, and amendments thereto, all as herein provided, and subject to the terms of an agreement for the benefit of the purchaser of the agreement, contract or plan. For the purposes of this act, personal property or funeral or burial merchandise shall include caskets, vaults and all other articles of merchandise incidental to a funeral service, but shall not include grave lots, grave spaces, grave memorials, tombstones, crypts, niches and mausoleums. This act shall not prohibit the funding of a prearranged funeral agreement with insurance proceeds derived from a policy issued by an insurance company authorized to conduct business in this state.
History: L. 1953, ch. 54, § 1; L. 1973, ch. 86, § 1; L. 1976, ch. 97, § 1; L. 1983, ch. 76, § 1; L. 1989, ch. 48, § 70; L. 1994, ch. 229, § 3; L. 2002, ch. 106, § 1; July 1.
Attorney General's Opinions:
Cemetery merchandise; defined. 85-134.
Counselor's commission. 86-123.
Cemetery merchandise trust funds; deposits in companies authorized to do business in Kansas. 1998-40.
Prepaid funeral plans; disposition of unused funds; prohibition of finance charges. 2000-22.
CASE ANNOTATIONS
1. Sections construed; statute is reasonable exercise of police power and constitutional; section applicable to contract for sale of burial vaults upon pre-need basis. State, ex rel., v. Anderson, 195 Kan. 649, 653, 408 P.2d 864.
2. Under facts as stipulated, contracts for sale of caskets did not fall within purview of section; moneys received not required to be placed in trust. Lakeview Gardens, Inc. v. State, ex rel. Schneider, 221 Kan. 211, 557 P.2d 1286.
3. Discussion of pre-1973 version of statute, coverage of burial markers. State ex rel. Stephan v. Commemorative Services Corp., 16 Kan. App. 2d 389, 390, 392, 393, 394, 395, 396, 403, 405, 823 P.2d 831 (1992).