Insurables — Australian business risk, sourced and dated

Funeral directors: insurance and scheme requirements

Arrangement and conduct of funerals, holding prepaid money in many cases.

Data as at

Required by law or licence

  • Licence liability condition: No licence exists for this occupation in New South Wales, so there is no licence condition to carry an insurance requirement. Any cover the business holds is driven by contracts, landlords and its own risk appetite rather than by a regulator. NSW · effective 2026-08-24 Building Commission NSW · 2026-08-13
  • Licence evidence required: None to a regulator, because there is no regulator of the occupation to produce it to. NSW · effective 2026-08-24 Building Commission NSW · 2026-08-13
  • Licensing body: Nobody, and unusually plainly so: "Funeral directors do not need a licence, specific training or qualifications to operate in NSW." There is no register, no minimum qualification and no entry requirement for the occupation itself. Premises handling human remains still attract public health obligations, and a business selling pre-paid funerals is regulated separately — but the funeral director role is not licensed. NSW · effective 2026-08-24 Building Commission NSW · 2026-08-13
  • Licence liability condition: No licence exists to carry an insurance condition. VIC · effective 2026-08-24 Victoria Government · 2026-08-24
  • Licence evidence required: None to an occupational regulator. The notification duty to the Registrar is about the death record, not about insurance. VIC · effective 2026-08-24 Victoria Government · 2026-08-24
  • Licensing body: Nobody licenses the occupation. Funeral directors in Victoria are not licensed at state level; the obligation that does exist is administrative — a funeral director must notify the Registrar of Births, Deaths and Marriages within seven days of a disposal of a deceased person's remains. VIC · effective 2026-08-24 Victoria Government · 2026-08-24
  • Licence liability condition: Not applicable to funeral directing, which is unlicensed. Insurance appears twice in the Funeral Benefit Business Act 1982 and neither occurrence is an occupational condition — both identify a company registered under the Commonwealth Life Insurance Act 1995 as a permitted holder or payee of trust fund money. QLD · effective 2026-08-25 Queensland Government · 2026-08-24
  • Licence evidence required: None for funeral directing. The registration, annual return and valuation obligations in the Act attach to funeral benefit businesses — anyone selling pre-paid funerals — which is closer to a financial products obligation than an occupational licence. Whether any public health side obligation applies to handling and transporting human remains was not established. QLD · effective 2026-08-25 Queensland Government · 2026-08-24
  • Licensing body: Funeral directing is not a licensed occupation in Queensland, and one Act is commonly mistaken for the one that licenses it. The Funeral Benefit Business Act 1982 regulates pre-paid funeral benefit trust funds, not the practice of funeral directing: its machinery is a registrar, trust funds, registration, annual returns, valuations and cancellation of registration. The phrase funeral director appears only four times in the whole Act, every one inside the list of what a funeral benefit may cover — transportation of the body by a funeral director, mortuary facilities and the services of a funeral director and staff, a casket supplied by a funeral director. The Act nowhere licenses, registers or imposes conditions on funeral directors. QLD · effective 2026-08-25 Queensland Government · 2026-08-24
  • Licence liability condition: No insurance condition was located in the published licensing requirements. The stated criteria concern reputation, fitness and premises. WA · effective 2026-08-24 Western Australia Government · 2026-08-24
  • Licence evidence required: None found for insurance. WA · effective 2026-08-24 Western Australia Government · 2026-08-24
  • Licensing body: Western Australia is the outlier: funeral directors ARE licensed there, under the Cemeteries Act 1986 (WA), through the Metropolitan Cemeteries Board or local boards. Applicants must have a good reputation and be considered fit to hold a funeral director's licence, and must have suitable facilities and equipment for handling and storing dead bodies and conducting funerals. Every other jurisdiction checked leaves the occupation unlicensed. WA · effective 2026-08-24 Western Australia Government · 2026-08-24
  • Licence liability condition: Not applicable. With no funeral director licence in South Australia there is no licence for an insurance condition to attach to. Insurance appears once in the Burial and Cremation Act 2013 and on an unrelated point: a disqualifying pecuniary interest in a person's death under a policy of life insurance or superannuation. SA · effective 2026-08-24 South Australia Government · 2026-08-24
  • Licence evidence required: Not applicable. No funeral director licence exists in South Australia. SA · effective 2026-08-24 South Australia Government · 2026-08-24
  • Licensing body: Funeral directing is not a licensed occupation in South Australia. The Burial and Cremation Act 2013 defines a funeral director as a person who carries on the business of arranging for the disposal of human remains, and imposes conduct and notification duties, but the words licence, licensing and licensed do not appear in the Act at all. There is no licensing regime to enter. SA · effective 2026-08-24 South Australia Government · 2026-08-24
  • Licence liability condition: No insurance condition. Across 149 pages and 162,949 characters of the Burial and Cremation Act 2019, the words insurance and indemnity appear zero times. Section 26(4)(a) lets the regulator grant an approval subject to any conditions it considers appropriate, so one could be imposed case by case, but nothing in the Act directs it at insurance. TAS · effective 2026-08-25 Tasmania Government · 2026-08-25
  • Licence evidence required: Fitness and character, not insurance. An application goes in at least one calendar month before trading, in an approved form with the prescribed fee. Under section 26(3) the regulator may consider convictions under the Act and related burial and cremation legislation, and whether the applicant is a fit and proper person to carry on the regulated business. Decisions are reviewable in the Tasmanian Civil and Administrative Tribunal. TAS · effective 2026-08-25 Tasmania Government · 2026-08-25
  • Licensing body: Funeral directors are regulated in their own right in Tasmania, which is not the case everywhere. The Burial and Cremation Act 2019 works through the concept of a regulated business, defined as a business for the handling, storage or transport of human remains, or the preparation of human remains for interment or cremation. Section 25 makes it an offence to carry on a regulated business without approval, with a daily continuing penalty. Cemeteries and crematoria are regulated separately under the same Act, so the answer to whether Tasmania regulates funeral directors or only facilities is both. TAS · effective 2026-08-25 Tasmania Government · 2026-08-25
  • Licence liability condition: Not applicable to funeral directing, which is unlicensed. Insurance appears once in the Cemeteries and Crematoria Act 2020, and it is a conflict of interest provision about death certificates concerning a financial interest in the death under a life insurance policy. Insured and indemnity appear not at all, and the Cemeteries and Crematoria Code of Practice 2026 has none of the three. Facility licensees are subject to perpetual care trusts, which is a financial security mechanism and a distinct concept from insurance. ACT · effective 2026-08-25 Australian Capital Territory Government · 2026-08-24
  • Licence evidence required: None. An ACT funeral director needs no occupational licence, so there is no insurance evidence to give. ACT · effective 2026-08-25 Australian Capital Territory Government · 2026-08-24
  • Licensing body: Funeral directing is not a licensed occupation in the ACT — the Territory licenses facilities, not people. The Cemeteries and Crematoria Act 2020, which replaced the 2003 Act, provides for a licence to operate a facility, held by the licensee of a cemetery or crematorium. The phrase funeral director appears four times in 141 pages and in every case only as an agent who may receive information on someone's behalf, never as a regulated party. ACT · effective 2026-08-25 Australian Capital Territory Government · 2026-08-24
  • Licence liability condition: Not applicable to funeral directing, which is unlicensed. The word insurance appears once in the whole Burial and Cremation Act 2022, in section 142, and it is a conflict of interest offence: a person must not sign a death certificate where they have a direct or indirect interest in the proceeds of a policy of insurance or assurance. That is not a licence condition and should not be read as one. NT · effective 2026-08-25 Northern Territory Government · 2026-08-25
  • Licence evidence required: Not applicable. A facility licence application goes to the Minister in writing and the Minister may specify conditions, with the grant gazetted and the licence displayed at the facility. No insurance evidence is required at any stage. NT · effective 2026-08-25 Northern Territory Government · 2026-08-25
  • Licensing body: Funeral directing is not a licensed occupation in the Northern Territory. The Burial and Cremation Act 2022 defines a funeral director as a person who carries on the business of arranging for the burial or disposal of human remains, but the term appears only twice in 117 pages — in that definition and in a burial register record-keeping provision. There is no application, no registration, no fit and proper test and no licence. What is licensed is the facility: section 123(1) lets the Minister grant a licence to operate a crematorium or other prescribed disposal facility, and operating one without a licence is an offence under section 124. NT · effective 2026-08-25 Northern Territory Government · 2026-08-25

Cover commonly held

Ordered by how central each cover is to this occupation. This is what businesses in the trade commonly hold and what contracts commonly ask for — it is not a statement that any of it is legally required, and it is not a recommendation.

  • Public liability insurance — Cover for legal liability to third parties for personal injury or property damage arising from business activities.
  • Professional indemnity insurance — Cover for legal liability arising from professional advice or services, written on a claims-made basis.
  • Workers compensation insurance — Statutory cover for injury to workers, arranged through each state or territory scheme rather than on the open market.
  • Commercial motor insurance — Cover for vehicles used for business, including utilities, vans and trucks, and liability for damage they cause.
  • Business pack insurance — A packaged policy combining property, liability and interruption sections for small business.
  • Money insurance — Cover for cash and negotiable instruments on the premises, in transit and in the custody of a person.
  • Commercial glass insurance — Cover for shopfront and internal glass, signage and associated damage after a breakage.

Statutory schemes that can apply

Checking what you hold

The document a principal, a landlord or a licensing team will ask for is a certificate of currency. The checker reads one and lists what it does and does not show.

Sources