Where we bring people home from
- From Italy — by far the most common route. 3–5 days, €2,500–4,500. The Romanian community is concentrated in Lombardy, Veneto, Piedmont, Rome, Turin.
- From Spain — 3–5 days, €2,500–4,500. Madrid, Barcelona, Valencia, Castellón.
- From Germany — 4–7 days, €3,000–5,500. Munich, Berlin, Stuttgart, the Ruhr area.
- From the United Kingdom — 5–7 days, €3,500–6,000. Brexit added a day or two of customs work. London, Manchester, Birmingham.
- From France — 3–5 days, €2,500–4,500. Paris, Lyon, Marseille.
- From Austria, Belgium, the Netherlands — 3–5 days, €2,500–4,500. Vienna, Brussels, Amsterdam.
- From the US or Canada — 7–14 days, €5,000–8,000. The jump is because of intercontinental air freight and slower consular processing.
What actually happens, day by day
Day 1–2 — the moment you call. You tell us what happened, where they are right now, and we get to work. We brief our partner funeral home in that country, send you one power of attorney to sign by email, and they go pick the deceased up.
Day 2–4 — abroad. The partner registers the death locally, performs the embalming under EU or international standards, fits the zinc-sealed casket the airline or carrier requires, and starts the mortuary passport.
Day 3–7 — the consulate. The Romanian consulate stamps the mortuary passport and issues the note verbale the airline needs. This is the slowest step — weekends and holidays add days.
Day of transport — the actual journey. Flight or truck, depending on country and your budget. We're at the Romanian airport or border when they land, and we drive them straight to where you've chosen for the ceremony.
Day of the funeral — home. The service, the burial or cremation, the memorial meal. By this point, you've been through enough; we run everything here too.
The paperwork — what each document is for
- The local death certificate — issued by the country where the death happened. Says where, when, why.
- The mortuary passport — the single most important paper. It's what authorises a sealed casket to cross borders. The Romanian consulate stamps it.
- The embalming certificate — proves the body was prepared to EU or international transport standards.
- The sanitary clearance — one issued abroad, one issued in Romania on arrival. Public-health paperwork.
- The deceased's ID — passport, Romanian ID card if they had one. The consulate keeps copies.
- The power of attorney — one form you sign, scanned and emailed. It's what lets us act for you in both countries.
- The consular note verbale — diplomatic correspondence between the Romanian consulate and the local authorities. We handle this without you ever seeing it.
What it actually costs and why
From the EU — Italy, Spain, Germany, France, Austria, Benelux — expect €2,500 to €5,500 all in. That's the embalming, sealed casket, every piece of paperwork, the flight or truck, and the pickup in Romania. Road transport from a close country is cheapest; air from a remote starting city or under time pressure is the upper end.
From outside the EU — the US, Canada, Australia — figure €5,000 to €8,000. The jump comes from intercontinental air freight, slower consular processing, and translating papers into Romanian.
Most families pay this out of pocket. If the deceased had life insurance, it sometimes covers part of it — worth checking with the policy. The Romanian funeral aid of 9,192 RON still applies if the person was insured or retired here, and we claim it on your behalf once they're home. It offsets the Romanian ceremony costs, not the international leg.
Cremation abroad — the cheaper alternative
If your family is open to it, having the cremation done in the country where the death happened, and then flying just the urn back to Romania, costs much less and saves a lot of time. You'd spend €1,500–3,000 total instead of €2,500–5,500. No mortuary passport needed — an urn isn't a casket, so border rules are simpler. The urn can sometimes even fly as cabin luggage with a relative.
The trade-off: Orthodox families lose the traditional open-casket service. Catholic, Protestant, and secular ceremonies still work fine with an urn. Worth a 5-minute conversation with us before deciding.
