Upfront % cost of wedding

PictureFrame

Hi all,

Just have a quick query that came to my attention during the week. Myself and my partner are due to getting married in October 2019 in a venue in the west of Ireland. We've paid a 3,000 deposit upfront to secure the date etc. and that is deductible from the overall cost of the wedding.

Upon examining the contract we were provided however, I realised that the venue is looking for a 90% payment one month before the date- I am just wondering does this seem quite excessive? Whilst I have no issue in paying such, it is more than with such a large chunk of the cost covered, I feel if something went wrong on the day, regarding food quality we are up a creek without a paddle considering vast majority of the cost would already have been paid.

Just wondering would anyone have any advice or is this the norm? Obviously I am new to all of this and just wanted some advice.

Thanks in advance,
PF

LirW

From what I've seen it's fairly standard that venues in demand want 70-90% covered beforehand and the remaining balance is due on the day you're leaving.
Not every venue does it, plenty do though.

S.M.B.

My wedding is in two weeks and we've already paid for the minimum amount of 100. Will settle the rest the day after which should be about 20% more.

love_love

Chiming in to say completely standard, it's in our contract as well.Withholding payment for not being happy with an aspect of the day sounds a bit dodgy legally.

infor123

We didn’t have to do this. Paid 600!deposit beforehand. We were told we could pay it before or after up to ourselves. Paid in full the day after the wedding.

I know what you are saying about something going wrong. When we went for a menu tasting, we were not impressed and while I know I was tied to a contract and couldn’t withhold payment I was still able to mention that I hadn’t paid for wedding and if anything went wrong I wouldn’t be paying them!! Everything was fab in the end but we were thrilled.

Gatica

we had to pay a good chunk of it (not sure if it was 90 or 70%) 4 weeks before the date too, and the last balance upon check-out from the hotel. I think if you're not happy with some aspect of their service, it's something you take up separately from the fee you pay them for their service. It's like if a landlord doesn't fix your washing-machine, you can't just withhold the rent. They still have to pay the staff that waited on you that day and the food they served, even if you didn't think it was up to the standard expected.
You should pick a hotel you trust to deliver on your wedding day. Hotels get a lot of business by word of mouth and reputation, so if they weren't upholiding their end of the bargain, it's would not look good for them. Does happen, but would image it's more rare.

tiredblondie

Mine was 1500 deposit - half the remaining balance 6 months beforehand and the final balance 5 days beforehand!

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tiredblondie wrote: »

Mine was 1500 deposit - half the remaining balance 6 months beforehand and the final balance 5 days beforehand!

Mine was the exact same. Anything over the final balance, drinks charged to rooms, room service etc. we could pay on departure. They didn't charge us for any of the extras we got in the end though.

Only a Deposit of 1000 euro was paid before hand and the balance was paid the day after the wedding in our case.

ChrissieH

That seems like a lot to me, what if the hotel went into liquidation or had a fire or something and couldn't host your wedding!!
I got married a few years ago and the 3 hotels we looked at had similar contracts, with a couple of hundred euro deposit upfront (the exact amount varied from one hotel to the next) but I'm sure the remainder was only due after the wedding, although we did pay off a chunk of it in the weeks leading up to the date; I wouldn't have been comfortable paying too much too far in advance because at the time, there were a few hotels that had closed down without warning, leaving people completely in the lurch.

I didn't realise that it was so common for hotels to expect such a large amount of the bill to be settled before the wedding, it's a lot of money to part with when, let's face it, most people are relying on their guests' gifts to cover the costs!

We paid €2000 up front. Then about 90% 3months before the date, and the remaining balance about 1week beforehand

Toots

It's pretty standard, most hotels will want the bulk of the bill paid before the day. We actually got money refunded the morning after because we'd drastically over estimated the amount of wine we'd need.

Make sure you pay it with a credit card so you'll have protection if the hotel goes belly up before the day.

fungie

A place we are thinking of booking wants the full amount paid a month before the date, is this normal?

the_syco

ChrissieH wrote: »

most people are relying on their guests' gifts to cover the costs!

I suspect this is why they want it upfront; to prevent people not paying for services provided, due to lack of funds.