General information, not financial or legal advice. Funeral AssistanceSA’s own page, run by South Australia’s Department of Human Services, is the official place to check, and its line is 1300 762 577.
South Australia
Two kinds of help
Which one applies depends on a single fact: whether a private funeral director has already been engaged.
| Detail | Full contract funeral | After-the-event assistance |
|---|---|---|
| When | No private funeral director has been contracted. | A private funeral director is already contracted and a debt remains. |
| What it gives | A basic funeral, normally a cremation, except in some cultural and religious circumstances. | A grant of up to $625, paid straight to the funeral director. |
| Also on the page | Family or friends may pay for extras, such as flowers or a memorial book. | The funeral’s cost must be modest, and the applicant must have tried to pay the debt. |
| Ruled out | A funeral that has already been arranged. | An account already paid in full. |
The full contract funeral, in the page’s own words, is “a basic, dignified funeral”. It covers a weekday cremation service at a church or chapel the program approves, or a direct cremation if the family prefers; a weekday burial where culture or religion requires one; the funeral director’s, crematorium and cemetery fees; a basic coffin and a hearse; the minister’s or celebrant’s fee; and the fees for every permit the law requires, though not the death certificate.
South Australia
Whose means are counted
The program weighs the income, assets and liabilities of the person who died and of their immediate relatives, which the page defines as a spouse, parents and adult children. Its eligibility test is a list worth reading whole:
“To be eligible, you must prove that the deceased:
- was a South Australian resident at the time of death
- received a pension or benefit, or had a low income
- has an estate and death benefits estimated at less than $4,000 when liquidated – including their house, personal property and shares
- has immediate relatives who:
- receive a pension or benefit, or have a low income
- do not have enough money to cover funeral expenses - less than $4,000 of accessible funds
- are not homeowners, or cannot borrow against equity in their home to pay for the funeral.”
Funeral AssistanceSA, as at October 2026
One more condition sits beside the list: every other way of raising the money or getting credit must have been tried first. The page also reminds families to tell Centrelink about the death, since proof may be asked for.
South Australia
What to gather
- One month of current bank statements, from the person who died and from every immediate relative. Without access to the person’s statement, their banking details are needed instead.
- A copy of the will, if there is one.
- Where the family is estranged, a statutory declaration explaining the circumstances.
The page also notes that the cost may already be covered another way, depending on how the person died. After a motor vehicle accident, Compulsory Third Party insurance may pay; where the person was a victim of crime, a claim for funeral costs and a grief payment can be made to the Commissioner for Victims’ Rights; and where the person had super or life insurance, the beneficiary may have to repay the funeral’s cost.
Western Australia · Queensland · Victoria
When a body is unclaimed, and elsewhere
Western Australia’s Bereavement Assistance Program, run by the Department of Communities, adds detail on paying to hold the person’s body. Once an application is approved and the program’s contracted funeral director is conducting the funeral, the department may also consider paying for a mortuary at a hospital, or at a funeral home outside the program’s contract, to hold the person, and also where the body has been unclaimed for a time and must be moved to a contracted funeral home.
Under the same approval, the department may consider paying to bring the person home where the family has shown it has tried every other source of funding, and only in exceptional circumstances, such as a death while temporarily away elsewhere in Western Australia, or to return an Indigenous person to their homeland. It does not pay to move a person across state borders, or where the family has arranged and paid for a private funeral.
- Bereavement Assistance Program (WA)
- Free call 1800 854 925
Two other official pages add a line each. Queensland Health’s guidelines for its hospital staff note that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people can apply for financial help, called Burials Assistance, at their local courthouse or the Office of the State Coroner. In Victoria, the Coroners Court’s list of support services says, under the Department of Families, Fairness and Housing, that low-income Victorians in financial hardship can get no-interest loans and other financial services, bereavement assistance among them.