Custom software for funeral homes, funeral groups, and direct cremation operators who need case management, family communication, billing, and memorial tools built around how a funeral actually runs, from first call to final disposition.
Generic CRM systems and disconnected point tools don't match the data model of a funeral. Arrangement records, billing, obituaries, family communications, and preneed contracts all need to connect. Right now, most funeral directors are holding that together manually.
Case management from first call through final disposition, with task assignment, document generation, and multi-location support
Online arrangement platforms for direct cremation and simple burial operators handling family self-service at any hour
Branded memorial and obituary websites under your domain, with condolences, galleries, livestreaming, and donation links
Funeral billing with itemized statements, installment plans, insurance assignment, and preneed financial reporting
The problem
Arrangement paperwork taking two to three hours per family because the service selection, the contract, the order of service, and the invoice are all assembled from separate documents rather than generated from one case record?
Obituaries and memorial pages published through a third-party aggregator that keeps the family's contact details rather than connecting them back to your funeral home?
Preneed contract funds and at-need billing tracked in separate systems, with no automatic conversion workflow when a preneed client passes?
Family members calling your office five times for a status update on permits and death certificates because there's no place for them to check on their own?
Short answer
RaftLabs builds custom funeral home software: case and arrangement management, online arrangement platforms for direct cremation operators, branded memorial and obituary sites, family communication portals, preneed contract management, and billing with payment plans, for funeral homes and funeral groups. A focused v1 launches in 10 to 14 weeks at a fixed cost agreed before development starts, then grows from there.
Most funeral homes operate on a patchwork of phone calls, printed forms, spreadsheet billing, and third-party obituary sites with no connection to each other or to the case file. An arrangement conference produces a service selection form that gets retyped into a billing document, then retyped again into an obituary submission. Permits and death certificates are tracked in a notebook. Preneed contracts sit in a filing cabinet. The funeral director holds all of it together through personal knowledge and follow-up calls. That's unsustainable as call volume grows and staff turn over.
Custom software ties the arrangement record, the billing, the family communications, and the memorial into one connected system. When a family selects a service package in the arrangement conference, the contract is generated from that record. The invoice is generated from the same record. The obituary drafts from the information already captured. The family portal updates automatically when the permit is issued. The funeral director focuses on the family rather than re-entering data into four separate places.
01 Diagnosis
The arrangement conference creates a data explosion, and the real work starts after the family leaves
An arrangement conference produces a tremendous amount of information in a short period of time, and the bottleneck comes afterward: service selections, casket choices, and merchandise decisions get retyped into a contract, then retyped again into an invoice. Each re-entry takes time and introduces errors. Entering information the funeral home has already collected is the most frustrating paperwork problem in the business. We build the case record once, at the arrangement conference, and the contract, invoice, and order of service generate from it. The outcome is two to three hours of paperwork becoming twenty minutes.
Preneed records aren't accessible when a family calls at the time of need
A preneed client passes and the family calls. The preneed contract is in a filing cabinet. Finding it, verifying the service selections, and confirming the funded amount takes time the family doesn't have. Pre-need is where the real, stable revenue in this business lives, and it's the first thing that gets squeezed out when the day gets busy. We build preneed contract management with searchable records, trust reporting, and an at-need conversion workflow: the preneed record becomes the active case record in minutes, with service selections carried forward and billing calculating the difference. The outcome is preneed revenue that survives the busiest day.
Case information scattered across notes, emails, and individual computers
Case information should stay connected to the case rather than scattered among handwritten notes, separate documents, emails, and individual computers. State-specific death certificates, burial transit permits, and cremation authorizations are prepared from scratch for each case, referencing the arrangement record manually. Errors in regulatory filings cause delays that reflect on the funeral home. We build the case record as the single source: compliance documents generate from it automatically, and filing status is tracked per case. The outcome is filings that stop slipping through.
Families calling five times for a status update nobody can give them
Family members call the office repeatedly for updates on permits and death certificates because there's no place for them to check on their own. Every call interrupts an arrangement conference or pulls a director away from a family in the room. We build a secure family portal where case status updates automatically as staff complete tasks: transfer completed, death certificate filed, permit issued, remains available for pickup. The outcome is families who check the portal instead of calling the office.
02 What we ship
Case management built around how a funeral runs from first call to final disposition. First call intake captures family details, deceased information, and initial service preferences in the case record from the first contact. Arrangement conference workflow records service selection, merchandise and package configuration against the case. Task assignment to staff covers embalming, transfer, documentation, and family contact, with deadline tracking and completion logging. Document generation from the case record produces the service contract, order of service, itemized statement, and disposition authorization without re-entering data. Multi-location case management for funeral groups. The outcome is one case record from first call to final disposition.
Self-service arrangement for direct cremation and simple burial operators whose families need to complete arrangements at 2am without a phone call. Service package selection with clear pricing and inclusions: immediate cremation, attended cremation, graveside service. Digital completion of required forms, authorization forms, and merchandise selections. Payment collection by card or ACH at the time of arrangement confirms next steps and expected timeline automatically. Upsell and add-on presentation for families who start with direct cremation and want to add a memorial service, an urn, or a keepsake. The outcome is arrangements that convert while the office sleeps.
Branded tribute pages hosted under the funeral home's own domain, not published through a third-party aggregator that keeps the family relationship and the contact data. Photo gallery with family-uploaded images. Condolence messages and virtual candle lighting for those who can't attend in person. Charitable donation links directed to the family's chosen organizations. Livestreaming integration for remote family members embedded in the tribute page. The outcome is a memorial page that builds your ongoing relationship with the family instead of handing it to a platform you don't control.
Itemized statements generated directly from the arrangement record: service items, merchandise, third-party charges, and cash advances. Multi-source payment tracking: personal funds, life insurance proceeds, preneed funds, each with expected and received amounts and outstanding balance by source. Installment plan management with payment schedule configuration, automated reminders, and accounts receivable tracking. Insurance assignment tracking from submission to funds receipt. ACH and card payment processing with automated receipts. Preneed financial reporting separate from at-need accounts receivable. The outcome is billing that reconciles itself.
Secure portal where the family can follow the case without calling the funeral home. Case status updates automatically as staff complete tasks: transfer completed, death certificate filed, permit issued, cremation completed, remains available for pickup. Document access gives the family death certificates, disposition authorization copies, invoices, and payment receipts. Digital arrangement review and approval lets families confirm service selections and sign documents without an additional in-person visit. Secure messaging between the family and the funeral director retains conversation history on the case record. The outcome is a family that checks the portal instead of calling five times.
Preneed contract management with the pre-selected service package, merchandise, and pricing locked at contract execution. Trust reporting for preneed funds held in state-mandated trust accounts: contribution tracking, fund growth, and distribution reporting. At-need conversion workflow when a preneed client passes: the preneed record becomes the active case record, service selections carry forward, billing calculates the difference. Insurance-funded preneed tracking with policy details against the preneed record. Preneed sales pipeline with lead tracking and follow-up workflow. The outcome is preneed as a managed revenue stream, not a filing cabinet.
Most funeral homes don't need to replace everything. They need the case record to stop being scattered across spreadsheets, notebooks, and sticky notes.
Keep what works
Your existing case management
FrontRunner, Passare, Tribute Technology: when the core case workflow runs well, integrate instead of replacing.
Your phone process
The arrangement conference stays human. Software takes the paperwork, not the conversation.
Build custom
The family portal
Case status, documents, and messaging in one place the family checks instead of calling five times.
The branded memorial
Tribute pages under your domain that keep the family relationship instead of handing it to an aggregator.
The online arrangement
For direct cremation operators: families arranging at 2am convert better than families reaching a voicemail.
Bottom line
Keep the case system that works. Build the family-facing layer around it.
04 How we work
Trusted by
05 Track record
08 Why us
09 Questions
A funeral is not a generic service transaction, so a funeral case record is not a generic CRM contact. The data model needs to capture the deceased and the family as a group with multiple contacts and roles. It needs the service package and merchandise selected, the third-party providers involved, the disposition type and location. And it needs the permits and documents required, the payment sources, and the preneed record if one exists. Every one of those elements connects to the others: the service selection drives the billing, the billing drives the payment collection, the case completion drives the memorial page publication. Building funeral software means designing that data model correctly from the start, not adapting a generic platform to approximate it.
A direct cremation operator's arrangement workflow suits self-service well because the service selection is simpler: the family is choosing between a few defined packages rather than configuring a full traditional service. The online arrangement platform presents the available packages with clear pricing and inclusions. It collects the required information about the deceased and the authorizing family member, presents any add-on options, collects payment, and confirms the arrangement with next steps and a timeline. Required forms are completed digitally and signed electronically. The funeral home receives a complete case record with all information captured and payment collected, without a staff member handling the arrangement by phone. Families who search for direct cremation services at 2am and find a clear, functional arrangement platform convert at a higher rate than those who reach a phone number with business hours.
Integration and replacement are different projects with different justifications. If you're using an established funeral home management platform and the core case management works well, integration is the right approach. We connect a custom family portal, a branded memorial website, or a preneed management module to your existing platform without replacing it. If your current platform is the source of friction: the billing is too rigid, the document generation doesn't match your workflows, the platform is being sunset, or you've outgrown it as a multi-location group. In that case, replacement is the right approach. We scope both during discovery. We'll tell you directly if an integration is the better answer, including an honest assessment of whether the integration is technically feasible given the platform's API capabilities.
A focused v1 covering one primary capability, such as an online arrangement platform for a direct cremation operator or a family communication portal added to an existing system, launches in 10 to 14 weeks, then grows from there. A full platform covering case management, billing, family portal, and memorial website is scoped separately. Multi-location funeral groups with preneed management, trust reporting, and complex multi-source billing are scoped individually. Cost depends on the number of locations, the scope of preneed management, integration requirements with existing systems, and whether a branded memorial website platform is included. Every project is priced at fixed cost before development starts.
Technology in the arrangement conference meets real resistance, and we've seen it. The answer is that the system has to reduce the administrative work competing for a funeral director's attention, not add to it. We design around the workflows your staff already run: the arrangement conference produces one case record instead of three documents, and the paperwork writes itself from that record. Staff test the real workflows during the build, not after. The system ships when your team can run a full case on it without help.
Tell us how your funeral home or funeral group operates today and what's creating the most friction. We'll tell you what we'd build and how.
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