A WELLINGTON funeral home has stepped in and stopped a fake mourner who was gatecrashing funerals, eating the food on offer, and even taking home leftovers.

The "grim eater" attended up to four funerals a week during March and April before the Harbour City Funeral Home stopped him, the Dominion Post reported.

Director Danny Langstraat said the company eventually grew concerned enough to take a photograph of the man and distribute it to its branches.

"He was showing up to funeral after funeral, and he didn't know the deceased," Mr Langstraat said.

The man, thought to be aged in his 40s, went to different churches and venues around the city's eastern suburbs.

"We saw him three or four times in a week. And certainly he had a backpack with some Tupperware containers, so when people weren't looking, he was stocking up."

The man was "quiet and polite, and did as the rest of the mourners in paying respects".

Mr Langstraat also said he was respectably dressed.

But he did suggest the man could have had mental health issues, because he was not discreet about taking the food.

He stopped coming after a staff member took him aside, telling him he could still come to funerals but could not take food home with him.

Originally published as Funeral gatecrasher eats his last supper