Guides and answers

Burial Desk is administration software for South African burial societies and funeral policy companies. It keeps members or policyholders, contributions or premiums, beneficiaries, claims and reporting in one place, with an app for the people you serve.

No. Burial Desk is a software provider only. It is not an insurer, underwriter, financial services provider or intermediary, and it does not give financial advice. Funeral policy companies that use Burial Desk remain responsible for their own licensing and regulatory compliance, including FAIS and FSCA requirements, product approval and policy wording.

Burial Desk runs in any modern web browser on a computer, tablet or phone, and as an Android app from Google Play. On an iPhone, use Burial Desk in Safari; there is no App Store app at the moment.

Give them a join code. Members enter it when they create their account and join your society straight away, then keep their own details up to date. Codes are eight characters long, last seven days and can be used up to ten times. You can also add members yourself, or import your member list.

Yes. An administrator can import members from a CSV file with each member’s full name, ID number and email address (phone and address are optional), up to 5 000 at a time. Every row is checked and shown to you before anything is created.

Only the member list comes across: past contributions and attendance are not imported, and you can enter an opening balance for each member instead. Imported memberships start on the day of the import, so talk to us first if your members are already past their waiting period.

Yes, once your society connects its own PayFast merchant account. Members pay by card or instant EFT from the app, the money goes to your PayFast account, and the payment is recorded automatically when PayFast confirms it. Members who pay in cash or by EFT can send the treasurer a photo of their slip to confirm.

Society plans are priced by the size of your society. Each plan has a member limit and a document storage allowance, and you can move to a bigger plan as you grow. The current plans, and what each one lists, are on our pricing page.

Every funeral company that registers is reviewed by our team before it appears in the online quote or policyholders can enrol themselves. The review is not a licence check or an endorsement: each company remains responsible for its own FSP licence and FSCA requirements. Your registration and FSP licence numbers, and documents such as your FSCA licence and CIPC registration, help us decide your application. If anything needs fixing, we tell you what, and you resubmit. While we review, you can set up your products and team.

No. When a policyholder enrols online, Burial Desk records the bank details, debit day and debit-order authorisation they give, so your office has them on file. Collections run through your own bank or collection arrangement, and you record what was collected, or confirm it from your bank statement.

Not yet. You can import the people on your book from a CSV file, but Burial Desk cannot yet carry their existing policies across: a policy written in Burial Desk starts on the day it is written, with a new waiting period, and there is no import of policies, covered lives or premium history. Talk to us about your book before you plan a move.

Burial societies pay one monthly fee for their plan, sized to their membership. Funeral policy companies pay a monthly fee for their tier, which includes a number of active policies, burial societies on group cover and admin seats, plus a monthly rate per group scheme and per member of the burial societies you cover through group schemes, charges for use above the tier's allowances, and any add-on modules; a once-off implementation fee applies. Prices are in rand and exclude VAT, which is added on invoices. There are no per-claim fees, and Burial Desk takes no cut of what members pay.

Every new burial society starts on a free trial, with reminders before it ends. To carry on, save a card on the Billing screen. Policy companies: talk to us about starting out.

We email an invoice each month a few days before it is due, with VAT shown separately. Pay it by card through PayFast, save a card so each invoice is collected on its due date, or pay by EFT using the details on the invoice. Administrators can see every invoice on the Billing screen.

Yes. Owners change plan on the Billing screen. An upgrade applies at once, and that month is charged by the days spent on each plan; a downgrade or cancellation takes effect on the 1st of the next month. Corporate and Enterprise plans are arranged with us.

We send reminders. A burial society whose trial ends with no payment set up, or whose invoice stays unpaid after a short grace period, is put on hold until it is paid. Members see that the account is on hold, administrators can still open Billing to pay, nothing is deleted, and access returns as soon as payment is made.

Under POPIA your organisation is the responsible party for the personal information of its members and policyholders. Burial Desk acts as an operator: it processes that information on your instructions, only to provide the service. Section 5 of our terms sets this out.

No. Burial Desk records payments; it does not hold, transfer or safeguard member funds. Where online payments are switched on, they are processed by a payment provider such as PayFast under its own terms, and settle according to your arrangements with that provider.