Costs of Deceased Repatriation

It’s difficult enough to lose a loved one. It’s doubly complicated and costly when they pass away while abroad.  And this has become an increasingly common problem as more and more companies operate trans-nationally and more and more workers begin to base overseas.

Human remains repatriation has therefore become a legitimate professional service provided by major companies around the world. With millions of professionals now working away from their state, or country, of origin, whether professionally or personally, long or short-term, the demand for repatriation of remains has steadily risen. For companies, the problem is becoming more alarming due to the fact that more than 25% of international assignees leave their employer within two years of returning home and more and more companies company are now planning for medical and human remain repatriation services that can help combat any reverse culture shock issues the assignee or family may experience or which may result to labor law infringement on the part of the employer or company.  Meanwhile, for many countries who are actually obligated to deceased bodies, the process of repatriating human remains is further imminent by a rising population of transients particularly elderly transients as a number of retirees now move abroad.

The advantages of contracting human remain repatriation is extensive. For insurance carriers, companies or host countries, bringing-in or transporting a body is a complicated logistic and administrative matter. And for families who are left behind, the stress and worry of getting bring their loved ones back home and to their appropriate resting place is extremely immense. And human remains repatriation services help address these. 

Repatriation of remains literally involve transporting a physical body, whether seriously ill or deceased, to his or her home country from another country or off-shore location.  Often enough, repatriation is confused with evacuation services. The difference is that human remain repatriation aims to bring a deceased body exactly to the point of origin while evacuation services are usually merely precautionary acts that bring patients to the nearest heath or treatment center. Even then, the case of both human remain repatriation and evacuation often do not include medical and healthcare expenses the way travel accident insurance policies do but they are still both considerably expensive. The difference however is substantial. It costs around $25,000 to fly patients to the nearest centre of medical excellence but a direct flight to the patient’s home country can cost up to $150,000 per flight.  But then, the cost of repatriation can still further vary considerably depending on choice of transportation.  For instance, some funeral shipping companies offer only air repatriation of human remains while others offer air, or sea, and land transportation. There is also a huge difference depending on whether you choose to transport non-cremated human remains, or cremated ones.

And then of course, the cost of repatriation varies depending on destination. Logically, the farther the host country from the land of origin, the more expensive. Since human remain repatriation usually involves international air transportation to avoid delay and decay of the human remain repatriation usually cost $3800 to as much as $10,000 to internationally ship human remains. This excludes funeral and other incidental costs.  In some cases, national holidays like Chinese New Year allows for significant tax breaks which may reduce cost.