A survey by the National Association of Funeral Directors shows only one in nine people has made their funeral wishes known to their loved ones. What are you waiting for?

A funeral can be as individual as the person it is for. There are two fundamental considerations - firstly, whether the body is to be cremated or buried and secondly, what kind of service is going to be held.

About 70 per cent of funerals are cremations. They are carried out at a crematorium and your funeral director can help you choose which one is most suitable for your requirements.

If you have a choice of crematorium, you need to weigh up convenience, cost and facillities.

You will also need to decide what you want done with your ashes. The crematatorium will be able to offer you the option to have them scattered on site or may have the option to have them interred there. Alternatively, you can make your own arrangements.

Generally, burials can take place in a churchyard if the person is a parishioner or a council-owned cemetery. You also may have the option of a woodland burial site depending on where you live and how far you feel your family or relations might be prepared to travel.

The laws and reulations surrounding burials are complicated, especially in respect of the ownership and use of the plot, and the types of memorials. You should take advice to make sure you are getting what you want. It is worth thinking about whether you want the route of the funeral to travel past memorable or significant place and whether you want a particular type of hearse.

You could, for example, have a horse-drawn one, a motorbike or VW camper van herse and one company will even provide a tank. (www.tanklimo.com)

When it comes to the services or celebrations, you are pretty much free to create an event that works for you.

If you are religious, the service will typically be led by a minister or officiant of your faith with, perhaps, contributions from your family and friends.

You could also have a secular or civil service. These are sometimes called humanist funerals.

Even if you have not taken out a funeral plan, it makes sense to write down any particular requests you have for your funeral and put them with your will or where you know they will be found.

It generally makes it easier for the person organising the funeral if they are aware of these special requests, which could be the choice of hymns or perhaps a charity you want donations to go to.

A guide has been launched to encourage people to write down how they want their funeral or cremation to be carried out after it emerged only 11 per cent had planned what would happen after their death. My Funeral Wishes was created by the Dying Matters coalition and the National Association of Funeral Directors to enable people to plan their own funerals down to the last detail. It can be downloaded from www.dyingmatters.org or www.nafd.org.uk