One Supervisor, Two Establishments
R.M. has held a Pennsylvania funeral director license for 16 years and has been the funeral director supervisor of record for a 60-call-per-year establishment in Scranton for 12 of them. In March he purchased a second establishment 22 miles away in Wilkes-Barre that performs about 180 calls a year. He listed himself as supervisor of record for both locations on the permit paperwork, intending to split his week between them. In practice he spends Monday through Wednesday in Scranton. Wilkes-Barre runs day to day on a licensed funeral director with 14 months of experience plus two unlicensed funeral service employees who answer the phone, quote package prices, complete the statement of funeral goods and services, and take casket selections. The Wilkes-Barre preparation room has a two-basin sink but no eyewash station and a ventilation system that recirculates interior air. In May the Board receives a complaint from a family stating that an unlicensed employee 'made all the arrangements' and that the body was embalmed at the Wilkes-Barre location. R.M. tells the investigator that the experienced director 'signs everything.'
1. Identify the Board licensing and supervision requirements implicated by R.M.'s arrangement and explain what must change.
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Framework. Funeral directing in Pennsylvania is governed by the Funeral Director Law (63 P.S. § 479.1 et seq.) and the State Board of Funeral Directors regulations at 49 Pa. Code ch. 13. Two concepts are doing the work here: the establishment permit and the designated supervisor.
1. Each physical location is a separate establishment. A location where funeral directing is practiced - arrangements taken, bodies prepared, merchandise displayed or sold - must be permitted as a funeral establishment. R.M. correctly treated Wilkes-Barre as a separate establishment; the error is in the supervision model.
2. A supervisor must actually supervise, and Board regulations limit a licensee to supervising one establishment. The purpose is accountability: one named licensee answerable for the direct management of that location. A split week across two cities, with the second location effectively run by a 14-month director and two unlicensed employees, does not satisfy that. Even setting aside the one-establishment limit, 'I am nominally the supervisor' is not supervision.
3. Options. (a) Designate the Wilkes-Barre director as supervisor of record if that licensee meets the requirements for supervisor designation, and file the change with the Board on the required form; (b) hire or contract a qualified full-time supervisor for Wilkes-Barre; or (c) restructure so that only one permitted establishment exists - but note that a second building used for visitations, arrangements, merchandise, or preparation will still usually be an establishment, so a cosmetic relabeling will not work.
4. Notice and records. Any change of supervisor must be reported to the Board and reflected on the establishment permit. Keeping a silent dual designation on file is itself a misstatement to the Board.
Bottom line: R.M. must pick one establishment to supervise, install a genuine supervisor at the other, and document actual day-to-day direction - not signature review. Confirm the current one-establishment text in 49 Pa. Code ch. 13 before filing.
2. The unlicensed employees completed statements of funeral goods and services and quoted package prices. Analyze the risk under the Funeral Director Law and Board regulations, and describe a compliant division of duties.
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What happened. Quoting a package price, advising a family on selections, completing the statement of funeral goods and services, and taking casket selections are not clerical tasks. Together they are the core of the practice of funeral directing: counseling a consumer, negotiating the terms of a funeral, and selling funeral merchandise and services. In Pennsylvania those acts are reserved to a licensed funeral director.
Risk to the individuals and the firm.
- Unlicensed practice: discipline of the employees is limited (they hold no license to revoke), but the licensed funeral directors who permitted and benefited from it face Board discipline for aiding unlicensed practice and for unprofessional conduct.
- Criminal exposure: practicing funeral directing without a license is a violation of the Funeral Director Law and can be prosecuted.
- Contract problems: a contract negotiated by an unlicensed person is a gift to a disappointed consumer - it supports claims of misrepresentation, undermines enforceability, and is a ready-made UDAP count under the Pennsylvania Unfair Trade Practices and Consumer Protection Law.
- 'He signs everything' is an admission, not a defense. A signature on a document the signer did not actually negotiate or review with the family is a false certification and aggravates the violation.
Compliant division of duties.
- Unlicensed staff may: answer the telephone, schedule appointments, hand a caller or visitor the current general price list and read prices verbatim from it, do clerical and filing work, drive, perform removals, and do custodial and maintenance work.
- Unlicensed staff may not: advise on selections, assemble a package, quote a total, discuss payment terms, complete the statement of funeral goods and services, take casket or vault selections, or sign as arranger.
- A licensed funeral director must conduct or be present for the arrangement conference, review each line with the family, and sign as the arranger - after having actually participated.
Adopt a written job-duty matrix, train to it, post it, and audit arrangement files monthly for arranger signatures.
3. What are the establishment and preparation-room problems, and what disciplinary exposure does R.M. face if the Board sustains the complaint?
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Preparation room. Board regulations prescribe minimum standards for a preparation room - impervious, cleanable surfaces, adequate plumbing, proper lighting, and ventilation that exhausts to the outside. A recirculating system moves embalming vapor and aerosolized material back into the building rather than out of it; that is both a Board deficiency and an occupational-safety problem. The missing eyewash station is a separate violation under OSHA's eyewash requirement (29 C.F.R. § 1910.151(c)) for employees exposed to corrosives such as formaldehyde-based fluids. If the room does not meet the Board's standards, embalming there is unprofessional conduct regardless of who holds the license.
Establishment permit. A permitted establishment must be inspected and must maintain the required equipment and facilities for as long as the permit is in force. Allowing the room to operate out of compliance while continuing to embalm converts an equipment problem into a permitting problem.
Disciplinary exposure. If the Board sustains the allegations, the realistic range is:
- Reprimand with a civil penalty - the most likely outcome where there is no consumer harm beyond the process failures.
- Suspension of the establishment permit and/or R.M.'s license, stayed in favor of a corrective action plan.
- Revocation is reserved for serious or repeated misconduct - for example, if investigation shows a pattern of unlicensed arranging across both locations or falsified records.
- Conditions: a Board-approved ventilation upgrade to 100% outside exhaust, installation of an eyewash, documented retraining, an outside audit of arrangement files, and periodic reporting to the Board.
Practical posture. The strongest mitigation is prompt self-correction before the Board acts: stop embalming in the Wilkes-Barre room, engineer the exhaust, install the eyewash, suspend unlicensed arranging immediately, designate a proper supervisor, and report the corrective steps to the Board in writing with dated documentation. A licensee who argues that 'the experienced director signs everything' has already conceded the core violation.