The consumer affairs office has never received complaints about unscrupulous undertakers offering unsolicited advice – and is urging people to come forward, a spokeswoman said.

The spokeswoman stressed that in order for the Malta Competition and Consumer Affairs Authority to investigate the issue, consumers first needed to “lodge a formal complaint, as no investigation could take place without tangible proof”.

Numerous reports have been received by this newspaper from families who were shocked at being “harassed” by undertakers so soon after a loved one had passed away.

A funeral director brought me cards for the family of a dying loved one

A number of family members described the practice as a “complete racket”, explaining how funeral directors called at their homes or phoned them to offer their services.

READ: Mere hours into their grief, the undertakers come calling

Some relatives also said they found out their loved ones had passed away because an undertaker was at the hospital ward – before family members had made it to the deceased’s bedside.

Relatives also said that their contact details were being released by third parties privy to such information.

Meanwhile, claims of commissions handed out by undertakers to those who pass on their business cards to those in mourning have also surfaced. Workers from homes for the elderly told this newspaper that they had often been given business cards and urged to hand them over to family members when their relatives passed away. “I was approached by a funeral director with some cards to give to families when a loved one was dying.

“In the 15 years I worked in the home, I only gave a card once to the family and was shocked when a funeral director later handed me €70 for doing so,” the employee told the Times of Malta.