About Plainfare

How we collect prices

Every price on Plainfare is labeled with its source, and every price we publish came from the provider: submitted by the business itself, taken from its published price list, given to us by phone, or extracted from the provider's own website. When that provider is a funeral home, the phone route works by right rather than by their courtesy: the FTC Funeral Rule (16 CFR Part 453) requires them to give accurate price information over the telephone. Where a price was collected automatically rather than by a person, we publish it only after someone here has approved it. We do not guess. Where we have no price we can publish, we say so rather than show an estimate dressed up as a fact.

Our editorial standards

• No fabricated data. We never invent prices, reviews, or coverage numbers. Every figure traces to a named source.
• Prices are not for sale. Providers can pay for featured placement, but no payment ever changes or hides the price we show a family. Any provider can submit and verify pricing at no cost.
• Your rights come first. We explain the protections families have under the FTC Funeral Rule and help them use them.
• Privacy. We do not sell your personal information. When you send a request to a provider, it goes to that provider if they have claimed their listing, and otherwise to us so we can pass it on.

How we make money

Plainfare is free for families. Providers can pay a flat monthly fee for a featured listing, and that is the only money we take from a funeral home, crematory, or cemetery. We never take a commission, a success fee, or any payment tied to whether a family buys something.

A featured listing buys position in the directory, nothing else. Where a paid listing is placed ahead of others it is labeled Sponsored and the list says the order is paid. Our compare tool and our search results are ordered without regard to who has paid. It is not a quality ranking, and it never changes, hides, or adds a price we publish.