Research and Markets: United Kingdom Funeral Plans Consumer Research Report 2020: Almost 160,000 Funeral Plan Sales but COVID-19 Cuts Net Sales Numbers - ResearchAndMarkets.com ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering. This report looks at the pre-paid funeral plan market and sets that into the context of how consumers pay for their funeral. It considers consumer use of funeral plans and other means they use to pay for their funeral, especially over50s insurance. It includes an assessment of the size of the market and its trends. At the end of 2020, the publisher expects there to be almost 1.6 million funeral plans in force (i.e. not drawn down). While the number has continued to rise in recent years, there has been a notable slowdown in growth in recent years. The number of new sales has declined steadily since 2016 mainly because of competition from over50s life insurance policies.