To expect wedding guests to book a room at the hotel we've booked for exclusive use not the hotel down the road

[maggiethemagpie]

So we're getting married.... we have booked an exclusive use hotel which means we will be charged for all rooms that are not filled. The wedding is on a Sunday so quite a few guests are going home on the Sunday night and not staying over. That I don't have a problem with. But one couple have booked two nights in the sister hotel to our hotel (so similar prices) as they could not book a room on the Saturday (as it is being used for another wedding). Despite knowing we will have to pay for all the rooms in 'our' hotel they are refusing to move hotels as they don't want the inconvenience.

I probably am BU as I know it was our choice to take the risk of an exclusive, and they can stay wherever they want, but as we will likely not fill more than half of the rooms we are facing a massive bill now (like 1.5k) and it just seems a bit unfair if they're staying in the sister hotel down the road just because they can't /don't want to move on the morning of the wedding.

Really wish I had not booked an exclusive venue now, especially on a Sunday night.

where is op ?

Get your contract and read it thoroughly, especially the parts about minimum numbers and final numbers. If you want to PM me I would be happy to have a look at it for you and let you know what I would do in your shoes. Blank out any personal info.

glad you ahve accepted you are BU

"I really thought more people would stay over and take the monday off"

why? How much annual leave do you think people have?

In terms of the deal, I don't know how it works but can you maybe get it so that guests would get a cheaper rate if they stay in your hotel? Some people might want to hear about that option - they might not take it up but they might be interested to hear about it. check out times etc will be an issue.

In terms of people going to expense to attend your wedding - half and half, in future I won't be doing any more hotel stay weddings, I have done it, but now have a small circle of close friends only so fingers crossed it doesn't come up again.

I think you've been sucked into the trap of lovely but pricey venue ,so gone for the cheaper option of a Sunday wedding. The pricey venue also has pricey rooms, your guests have done exactly the same as you have and chosen the cheaper option by staying elsewhere (if at all).

I think you run the risk of looking like a bit of a cheapskate if you start trying to fill rooms by asking people to swap hotels purely to lower the cost for you. Especially since you're already having a cheaper wedding and potentially using their annual leave to do so.

"delegating" the hotel stuff to someone else seems very unfair. I suppose they can always say no, but then I imagine a bridesmaid posting here "I want to be supportive of my mate's wedding but she's just asked me to take on this PITA duty, is it being U to refuse..."

also if OP is paying, I imagine the hotel will want to do any negotiations with her direct anyway.

YABcompletelyU They are guests coming to your wedding - it is entirely up to them where to stay. it would be an unbelievable PITA to have to move hotels on the day of your wedding!

I think the idea to offer rooms at a nominal rate sounds ideal, as you say it will save people having to faff with taxis etc and be much nicer as people can pop to rooms and freshen up during the post day pre Eve reception lul, so win win. I think it's perfectly acceptable to explain you have had to pay for all the rooms so it would help you out if people booked there and you are subsidising the cost.

I think what I will do is leave it til just before the wedding mention to friends/people we know well that we have some spare rooms and if they want a nice night in a hotel and not worry about taxis etc do they want to take one for a contribution?

That way it is up to them how much they pay any money better than none for us, some of our localish friends may opt to do this rather than get a taxi home.

But I'm not going to worry too much about it if we end up paying for the unused rooms will prob be 1.5-2k, just accept it and not let it spoil the wedding.

We only booked Sunday to save money but if we end up paying for the unfilled rooms it will have been a total false economy.

It sounds very much like you booked a venue far enough away tried to save yourselves some money by expecting your guests to subsidise it and it has backfired.

The issue is checking in and out, not the price of the venue on your wedding night.

Those staying over the night before wouldn't be able to check in before your wedding so they'd rather stay in the same place for 2 nights.

Offering the venue rooms cheaper won't help that.

I naively thought that if your venue had rooms as part of the deal, then you'd give them to the wedding party for free. I'm now thinking back to a wedding I attended about 10 years ago where the couple were very keen to have us stay at the venue. They told us they'd negotiated a special rate of £150 per night which seemed quite a lot at the time. It wasn't even a proper hotel so we couldn't carry on drinking after the party had stopped. So we helped fund their wedding, on reflection.

If you do offer nominal rates will that be for everyone (fair) or just those who haven't booked yet?

I'd be unimpressed if I was a guest paying 100% and another guest of equal standing (not mother of the bride or something!) Was only paying 50%. Especially if I only booked the hotel to be supportive of the bride & groom exclusivity clause.

Camelfinger it was always positioned with us (by the venue) as a sell your rooms back to your guests type scenario. We very much got the impression that this is how it works!

Bear "It sounds very much like you booked a venue far enough away tried to save yourselves some money by expecting your guests to subsidise it and it has backfired."

yes it does sound like this.

If I were local and someone offered me a night in a hotel, even at a reduced rate, I'd still want to go to my own home. It seems weird to pack up all your stuff and check into a hotel nearby unless it's a really massive treat at a humungous discount?

I wouldn't wait as people will make other arrangements, just be honest, say that rooms will be available at, for example, half the normal rate because of the exclusive use and it would be great if anyone can manage to book in and join you for breakfast the next morning.

Who said the venue is far away? its two miles down the road from us. But a lot of my intended's family, and about half of mine, live elsewhere.

Problem is Phalen, I will feel a bit mean if some people are paying full whack now and then find out someone else has it offered to them for half price.

By waiting til nearer the wedding it doesn't feel as bad if that makes any sense?

I'll bet you that the hotel know that they never ever fill the hotel on a Sunday night, so by passing over the obligation to you to fill the rooms they effectively sell all the rooms in one go. Bingo.

it was always positioned with us (by the venue) as a sell your rooms back to your guests type scenario.

So what was in it for you then? I genuinely don't understand this approach. Why would you take the financial risk of not filling hotel rooms, when it is only the hotel that stands to gain?

I think you should only book this sort of arrangement if you are able to afford to offer the rooms to guests for free. If you couldn't afford to do this, you should never have booked it at all. Attending a wedding is expensive and a lot of people will have just booked somewhere that's cheaper - and those who've booked the sister hotel will have just done the easiest thing and book 2 nights in one place.

Unfortunately there is no cheap way to have an expensive wedding. I tried, and had to accept in the end that it wasn't going to happen! Try to let it wash over you and not spoil the day. You can certainly offer the rooms for a reduced rate to friends and try to fill them - that sounds like a good plan.

Ps I'm always up for an excuse to stay away somewhere so I'd book a room if the hotel was nice which it sounds like it is. I think your issue is the Sunday night thing, this really isn't great when it falls on a regular weekend. I'm sure your guests would have been more likely to stay on a Saturday, I would brace yourself for a low key evening do as people will start to head home much earlier, I'd invite everyone you've ever met to the evening to bulk out numbers!! AnD let people know about the room deal, some people might not have work the next day and fancy it. I'm sure the wedding will be lovely overall

Origami - we liked the venue as it is a small boutique hotel, we have young children as do many of our friends/family and so didn't want a non hotel venue as we thought people with kids wouldn't stay late, the idea behind a hotel venue was that people could stay put the kids to bed and we'd get in a childcare service, and then continue to party.

I honestly thought as DHto be has lots of family from out of town that most of them would come and stay over...I see now that having it on a Sunday was a bit of a gamble but we couldn't afford that venue otherwise, we had it the last sunday in their off peak season which halved the venue costs. all very well and good people saying we shouldn't have scrimped but we are not rich so like everyone else wanted to get a good deal nowt wrong with that.

What lorelei said.

Also a collegue of mine had a sunday wedding to save themselves money but as soon as the evening buffet finished about 10 pm the place emptied.

OP "Problem is Phalen, I will feel a bit mean if some people are paying full whack now and then find out someone else has it offered to them for half price."

oh yes, I see that.

As you're footing the bill for the whole hotel, is there any way it can be done to try and fill the rooms and then split the bill more equally - so even those who booked in already could get a discount on the basis that more rooms have now been filled?

It was a bad move to bank on people taking the Monday off. Saturdays are more popular and expensive for a reason, and Sunday's normally a cheap night to stay. However it sounds like your guests who do stay are paying something of a premium compared with the local competition. And possibly not entirely through choice - they may feel something of an obligation to be staying somewhere more expensive than they'd normally have chosen.

I'm not sure about offering a discount rate now - if I were a guest who'd booked full price I might feel a bit taken advantage of if I found out that lots of others were getting it cheaper. If it were just a couple of last minute stragglers, it would be different.

To be fair, I found quite a few hotels who only accepted weddings on an all-inclusive basis: the couple has to book every single room, the hotel refusing to sell them to anyone else as it wouldn't fair to impose the noise on other guests.

I am not sure you then charge your guests to use them? It's just part of the package. It's a bit different if the guests chose to book a room themselves in a hotel open to everyone.

I wouldn't really mind either way, not everybody has a fortune to spend. what I can't stand are open bars, guests expected to pay for their own drinks, what is that all about!