Running the business ・ Updated 2022-05

When a loved one dies during a trip: what to do

Best never to face it in your life, but if you do, you'd better know what to do.

It's finally over. Thinking back to the moment the tour leader called it in, it all still feels so unreal.

In over 15 years in the business, we've handled countless incidents big and small, at home and abroad: every kind of problem, every kind of hospital visit. But this was the first time someone "passed away" during a trip.

Even though I'm not family, it still feels to me like a nightmare, so unreal. You wake up, catch your breath, think it was a dream and nothing happened, but it did happen. If it's like this for someone helping on the side like me, how much more so for the family.

I remember a family member saying: "Is this real? Yesterday I was at home listening to you tell me what Penghu was like, and only now do I realize I'm in Penghu." Hearing that truly brought tears to my eyes; but the heartbreaking details are not ours to share.

This post mainly shares what to do when a loved one dies during a trip. This happened in Penghu, so we use how it's handled in Penghu as the example; elsewhere in Taiwan it's similar. The details may differ slightly, but the overall process won't be very different. Below, from the travel agency staff's perspective, we explain it from two angles.

On-site staff: from calling an ambulance to giving statements

The very first thing, and the most important, is to call an ambulance. At the same time, check whether there's anyone or anything on site that can help with first aid, just like the flight attendant in the movies calling out "Is there a doctor on board?". Whether on-site staff can provide emergency care involves too many issues (training, experience, certification, possible improper handling) to go into here; while calling the ambulance, if medical staff talk you through simple first aid, follow their instructions as best you can.

Next, quickly find out about the patient's condition (medical history, medications, emergency contacts, etc.). If there's no family in the group, contact the family right away so you can explain to the paramedics afterwards; if family are on site, they must go to the hospital too, because there may be a lot to sign that you'd rather not, and only family can sign it.

The tour leader and the guide split the work: one carries on with the group's itinerary, the other goes to the hospital.

When the worst happens and resuscitation fails, the doctor will inform the family and ask for their consent before issuing a death certificate. The death certificate is extremely important; without it, nothing else can proceed. But sometimes the family disagree about the cause of death, and then a forensic examination is needed first (more on that later).

Once death is confirmed, have a funeral services provider take over. The hospital won't recommend any funeral provider and will ask the family to find one themselves; the police will give the same answer, mainly to avoid disputes and penalties.

At this point there's only so much on-site staff can do, so report the situation as soon as possible to the travel agency colleague in charge, and let them take over. Finally, to avoid disputes about the cause of death, the police may ask 2–3 people to give statements; once on-site staff have helped with that, they return to the original itinerary, and the follow-up staff take over.

Follow-up staff: helping the family through every procedure

After the call from the site, immediately confirm with the family how many people will be going to handle things, and get ready to book flights, accommodation and transport. How long to plan for varies, from 1 day to 3–5 days, because it depends on the family understanding what happened, scheduling the forensic examination, applying for documents, and transporting the deceased or cremation, so be generous with the estimate. This time we estimated at least 3 days.

Once the family has been contacted and flights booked, confirm these things in order:

• Arrange local transport (it will be used a lot).
• The funeral services contact: ask the family for a contact, and confirm that someone on site has taken over and been contacted. This part is bound to be chaotic, because the family didn't expect it and may never have discussed or bought a pre-need funeral contract, so it needs patient help.

Whether or not there's a death certificate makes the process completely different:

• No death certificate: wait for the prosecutor and forensic doctor to schedule a criminal forensic examination. If there are no visible external injuries, an autopsy may be involved; before the examination, the body can't be moved and nothing else can be arranged.
• With a death certificate: the family can choose local cremation or bringing the deceased back to Taiwan. Returning to Taiwan is only possible by ship to Kaohsiung (airlines won't accept it), and a mobile refrigerated unit or a coffin must be arranged, or the shipping company won't accept it.

Once the family arrive in Penghu, help them to:

• Go to the funeral home to identify the deceased.
• Go to the hospital to obtain the medical certificate and medical records.
• Go to the police station to understand what happened, confirm whether there's any dispute, and whether a new criminal forensic examination is needed.
• Discuss the next steps with the funeral provider.

Note in particular: funeral providers are also divided by region, just as travel agencies have tour operators and local ground handlers. The funeral services provider the family found may use a local partner nearby, so the people the family meet on site aren't the ones they spoke to in Taiwan. So throughout the process, communication among the four parties (travel agency, family, funeral services company and local funeral provider) is extremely important: confirm and reconfirm, hand over and hand over again as much as possible, to avoid mishearing or missed double-checks causing more mistakes and further hurt.

This time the arrangement was to bring the deceased back to Taiwan. The family needed to prepare their personal seal and the deceased's household registration transcript, to give to the local provider to arrange the shipping; on arrival in Taiwan, the Taiwanese funeral services company took over.

In short, what the follow-up staff mainly do is help the family: amid all the confusion, so the family don't have to worry about all the administration, transport, contacts and arrangements, and can get through every procedure smoothly with no document missed. That's the only thing others can do, and the greatest help to the family.

It looks short, but it weighs a lot

The account above looks brief, but the effort it took to complete these procedures goes far beyond the words. For example, the single line "have a funeral services provider take over" means:

1. The family has to contact everyone in the family to check whether the deceased had a pre-need contract or a funeral services company they used (and every time it's explained, it hurts all over again).
2. If they don't know one, they have to find a suitable funeral services company or funeral parlor as fast as possible (not just on Google, but calling them one by one to ask how they'd handle it).
3. Once found, confirm the local contact and pass it on to the on-site staff.

Just this one line, from informing the family that day to finally confirming and passing it to the on-site staff, with all the back-and-forth calls, asking around and confirming, took about 4 hours, and there were so many other steps besides. Think of how helpless, uncertain and panicked the family felt during that time, and you can see how anxious it was.

That's what travel agency staff need to do when a death occurs. We won't go into more detail; we only hope everyone travels smoothly, comes home safely and never has to face this.

This article is adapted from the iTour Pixnet post "One-way trip: a case of handling a death" (2022-05-25), translated from Chinese. It shares our experience; actual regulations and procedures are as set by the competent authorities.