선불식 상조업의 규제와 소비자보호

We overview the regulation on the prepaid funeral business in Korea and suggest policy implications about the consumer protection. As the prepaid funeral business has grown rapidly since the early 2000s, many consumer damages were reported and the adequate regulations were requested. At 2010, the Installment Transactions Act was wholly amended to include new articles about the prepaid installment business but the level of regulation was not very strict due to the incumbent companies who are usually small sized and not well capitalized. The regulation has been stepped up several times to protect the consumers but it was not enough. Especially the capital requirements, the preservation ratio of down payments, and the collateral requirements of the mutual aid contracts among the companies should be strengthened. Recently the prepaid funeral plans are combined with other commodities such as travel products and home appliances. Therefore we need more inclusive legal apparatus to protect consumers from these complex service plans. The prepaid funeral business are getting bigger and continues to be concentrated in the metropolitan area. The funeral related industries have many regional ties and thus local governments might be interested in supporting the prepaid funeral businesses to make efficient cooperatives. It would be desirable for the mutual aid associations to concentrate upon the SRO(self regulation organization) function and consumer protection as business associations.