KQ stirs funeral transport market with cut-price rates

The entry of Kenya Airways into the funeral transport business has stirred the segment where traditional notions have put off most low-income earners.

The KQ Cargo is transporting human remains at less than one quarter of the prices demanded by conventional service providers plying routes to Nairobi, Kisumu, Mombasa and Malindi. The national carrier charges only Sh25,000 from Nairobi to Mombasa, Kisumu or Malindi and Sh35,000 between Kisumu and Mombasa or Malindi.

“The service depends on the frequency of flights to the destinations involved and how early the bereaved books for it and presents all the required documents,” an official at KQ’s market department told Shipping & Logistics yesterday.

The airline has about eight daily flights between Mombasa and Nairobi and four between Kisumu and Nairobi.

“These rates only apply during the trial period that ends on March 31, 2015 after which the airline will review them,” said the KQ official.

The airline is trying out the service in partnership with Lee Funeral Home, the University of Nairobi’s Chiromo Mortuary, Kenyatta National Hospital, Umash Funeral Home, Montezuma & Monalisa Funeral Home and Kenyatta University. The rock-bottom prices have rattled the market where hearse operators demand as much as Sh300,000 to transport bodies to destinations that KQ seeks to cover.

Among the top-end hearse operators, the Lee Funeral Home charges Sh220,000 to transport a body in a Limousine to Kisumu, Sh195,000 in an 11-seater Mercedes van and Sh170,000 in a 14-seater Mercedes.

“We don’t just drop bodies to destinations but we also provide equipment like trolleys and gazebos for grave-side services,” an administrator at the Lee Funeral Home who asked for anonymity said yesterday.

A number of hearse operators have brushed off KQ’s foray onto their tuff saying most parts of the country lack airports to guarantee its success. A number of people interviewed, however, said they would opt for the lowest overall cost of getting a loved one’s body to its final destination resting place.

Apart from the hearse operated by funeral homes, low-income earners prefer to negotiate “welfare rates” with public transport vehicles to ferry the remains of their loved ones home. Under the welfare rates, a minibus charges around Sh60,000 to transport a body from Nairobi to Kisumu, a 14-seator asks for Sh30,000 while a school bus takes Sh50,000 to cover the same distance.

“Most people would still opt for welfare rates because you end up transporting the body plus property and scores of mourners at one go,” said Mr George Nyabiwa, who used the welfare arrangement to transport the body of a relative to Siaya last weekend.

He says air transport would force mourners make additional logistical arrangement once the body arrives at the nearest airport.

“I know of many people who have paid only Sh20,000 to Probox operators in Nairobi to deliver the body to Kisumu,” says Mr Nyabiwa.

[email protected]