Where personal effects, the casket and the cremated remains get scanned on a typical cremation case, what each scan means, and how it all adds up to a complete chain of custody.
Chain of custody has always tracked the deceased. This walkthrough is about everything else that belongs to the case: the ring on a finger, the suit the family brings in, the bag of jewellery waiting to go home, the casket and the urn. It describes what staff do and what the record shows. It does not cover how the software works.
A bag of jewellery sits on a shelf and nobody calls the family. Today the only record is paper and memory. The fix is simple: every physical thing that belongs to a case carries a sticker, and whenever it moves, someone scans who, what and where.
Whoever is signed in, or a badge scan on a shared device. Every record says who handled the item.
One or more stickers: the deceased’s wristband, a bag, a casket sign, an urn. Each sticker names exactly one thing.
A placard on the wall at the shelf, cooler or chapel. It means one thing only: it is here now.
Scans collect in a basket on screen. A placard applies to everything in the basket that doesn’t have a place yet, so staff can scan in whatever order suits the work in their hands.
Nothing is recorded until they confirm, and the basket shows anything still missing a place. There are no modes or menus to choose from.
Striped barcodes go on physical things in custody. Square QR codes go on paperwork, and only on paperwork, so it’s obvious at a glance which is which. Scanning a form can never be mistaken for scanning the deceased.
The only label that carries the deceased’s own code. It never appears on anything else.
Names the casket itself. Once the deceased is in it, scanning the sign counts as scanning them. A reprint replaces the code, and the old copy stops working.
Peeled from a pre-printed roll and stuck on the bag. The bag is what’s tracked; what’s inside stays on the signed paper list.
The remains get their own code, separate from the deceased’s. It moves from the bag to the urn when the remains are urned.
On the wall at each shelf, cooler, prep room and chapel. Only ever means here, now.
Finds that form on its case. It isn’t a custody scan. Not every form has one, and outside forms (government, crematorium) never do.
The gesture is always the same. What gets recorded depends on what was scanned and where the person is in the app. Each kind has an icon, used again in the case diagram below.
The everyday scan: things plus a placard, inside the case. “These are here now, and I put them here.”
The wristband and the casket sign, scanned together. Two independent labels in one act is the identity check.
Releasing an item to someone outside the funeral home. The person collecting is checked against the case’s list of who may receive what.
“Whose is this?” Scan any sticker from anywhere in the app, without opening a case. It shows the case, what should happen to the item and where it was last placed.
A sticker from a different case, scanned while you’re working on this one. It’s shown in red and the basket can’t be confirmed until it’s removed.
Scanning the square code on a form opens that form on its case. Scanning screens for custody refuse it as “this is a document.”
A typical cremation. The deceased arrives wearing a ring, a watch and a wedding band. The family brings a suit, asks for the ring and watch back, and wants the wedding band to stay on. There’s a viewing, the cremation happens at an outside crematorium, and the family collects the urn and the jewellery together. Read across for time and down for the things being tracked. Numbers match the steps in § 05.
← Scroll sideways to see every stage →
Not shown: moves between locations. To keep the diagram readable it leaves out the transfers between places, such as care centre to funeral home and back, or the trip to the crematorium. Each of those moves can scan one or more of these items: a custody scan when they’re picked up and when they arrive, and often a lookup scan at pickup to check what’s being collected. A lookup only records a sighting; the custody scans are what record the move.
Staff apply the wristband, then scan their badge, the wristband and the cooler placard, and confirm. If loose effects arrived too, such as a hospital belongings bag, it gets a sticker and goes in the same basket.
The care centre doesn’t remove effects until the contract is signed. The ring, watch and wedding band go on the Initial Analysis. Staff may also photograph them, as long as the photo doesn’t show the deceased, but that’s optional; Kearney doesn’t photograph effects consistently today. They’re recorded as one “with the deceased” item with no sticker; it goes wherever the deceased goes.
It’s printed for this case with the form’s own square code, so the filled-in sheet can be found again or filed against the right case. It’s the only record of what arrived on the deceased, so a photograph at arrival helps when one is taken.
The director and the family fill in the Personal Effects Inventory by hand and both sign it: the suit is to be worn, the ring and watch come back, the wedding band stays on. Afterwards the director bags what the family brought. There can be several bags, one for each place the items are going (for example, clothes to be worn in one, keepsakes to go back in another). The director stickers each bag, picks what should happen to it, and scans them all to the shelf placard in one go. In this case there’s just one, for the suit. The signed form is scanned into the case. Nothing on it is typed in.
Two scans in one basket link this casket to this deceased. From then on the casket goes wherever they go, and scanning its sign counts as scanning them, which matters at the crematorium.
The clothing bag is now “with the deceased.” That isn’t final yet: anything on the deceased can still come off before the cremation.
The contract is signed, so the jewellery the family wants back is removed. Whoever removes it starts a return bag on the spot: sticker, “return to family”, scan to the effects shelf. The wedding band stays on.
The Preparation Sheet’s “jewellery / clothing to be returned” line gets its usual initials, and staff confirm in RequiemOS that the bags match the paperwork.
Staff scan the casket sign and the chapel placard. Because the casket holds the deceased, this records the deceased’s move, and everything with them moves too.
The family asked to see the ring on. It comes out of the return bag and is worn, so the bag is “with the deceased.” Afterwards it goes back in the bag, which is scanned back to the shelf.
They scan it from anywhere in the app and see whose it is, that it’s waiting to go back to the family, and where it was last placed. That records who saw it and when, but it doesn’t move it. To put it back properly, they open the case and scan it to the shelf.
It travels with the deceased in the dispatch packet so the crematorium can put it on the bag, even an outside crematorium that doesn’t use RequiemOS. The label belongs to this case from the moment it’s printed, but there are no remains to track until the bag comes back (step 15).
Before cremation, staff confirm that everything the family asked for back is in the return bag and not still on the deceased. The system can’t see inside a bag, so a person confirms it.
The departure is scanned on the casket sign. When the cremation is recorded, everything still with the deceased (the suit, the wedding band and the casket) is marked as gone with them, each as its own entry.
Scanning the label against the case brings the remains into custody in their own right. Scanned against any other case, it’s refused.
The remains go into the family’s urn and the urn sticker takes over the remains’ code. The remains keep the same record.
The metal ID disc number and the cremation ID come back on the crematorium’s paperwork and are typed onto the case. They’re recorded against the case.
The director opens the case and sees everything waiting to go back. The person collecting is checked against the case’s list of who may receive what. Only someone entitled to the remains can take them, and anyone else needs a director’s recorded override. The return form is generated from what’s being handed over, then signed. Each bag and the urn closes on its own; they don’t have to go at the same visit.
The system may remind the director that a case looks ready, but closing is always their deliberate act. If any item still isn’t finished, the close is refused and the director sees exactly which ones.
The paper forms stay. Staff change what they scan, not what they write. Each form lines up with a moment the system already records, which is how the paper and the custody record match at the end.
| Paper moment | What it captures | What the custody record shows |
|---|---|---|
| Initial Analysis · arrival | What arrived on and with the deceased | The “with the deceased” item, any loose-effects bags, and photographs if any were taken |
| Effects Inventory · arrangement | What the family wants back, signed by the family and director | What’s meant to happen to each bag |
| Preparation Sheet · preparation | What actually came off the deceased | The return bag being created, and the staff confirmation |
| Return Form · handover | What was handed over, signed by the person collecting | Each item released to an authorised person; the form is generated from these |
Any bag nobody has scanned or looked up for too long appears on an operational list. A lookup counts as being seen.
Still being decidedSomeone confirms nothing the family asked for is still on the deceased. Without it, the cremation can still be recorded, but the case shows a missing check for the director.
Still being decidedEvery tracked item must have reached a finish before the case can close:
The system knows every bag, where it was last placed, who handled it and whether it went home. It does not know exactly what is inside. Contents live on the signed paper, plus any photographs staff chose to take. If a family disputes what was in a bag, the record proves the bag’s journey, and a photo helps if there is one, but it can’t prove a list.
It shows in red as belonging to another case and the basket can’t be confirmed until it’s removed. Nothing is written on the case you’re in; the scan is noted on the bag’s own case as a sighting.
The director places the item in unclaimed hold with a reason. The case can then close, but the item stays on an unclaimed list and in lookups until someone collects it or it’s disposed of under the unclaimed policy.
The reprint gets a new code and the old copy stops working. If a stray old copy is scanned anywhere, it’s refused, so it can never be taken for the deceased.
For example, shipped out, collected by another funeral home after a cancellation, or retrieved by the coroner. Anything still with the deceased probably goes with them, released to whoever receives them.
Each urn or keepsake container gets its own code, so each can go to a different person and be signed for separately.
These are tracked like any other item, but they can’t be handed over or sent to a lab until the family’s consent form is signed. If the form isn’t signed, the handover is stopped at the counter.
This page describes the process. The decision records hold the detail: ADR-072 (personal effects and container tracking: the basket, bags, caskets, sightings, handover and close), ADR-069 (scanning the deceased, wristband lookups), ADR-039 (what each label carries; QR for documents only) and ADR-033 (codes on printed forms), all in docs/decisions/. The station and scanning operations are in docs/planning/custody-scanning-stations-and-mobile-options.md.
For the deceased’s own custody, including corrections and the medical-device check before cremation, see the companion Chain of Custody overview.