Who was unreasonable at this wedding

[Dottie39]

Couple getting married. Family and long distance friends invited for whole thing, fairly small ceremony with around 40 guests and sit down meal.
Local friends invited to party afterwards.

After the ceremony, but before the meal, local friend arrives. His invite clearly said to come for evening only. He asks if he can join for meal but is told by staff all good is prepared however he can go to bar and order something himself. Bride and groom are oblivious to all this. (I'm sure if they had known they would have been more accommodating)

Local friend orders meal and stays for party.

The next morning when bride and groom check out they discover local friend has charged his meal and drinks to their room. They refuse to pay assuming mistake. Local friend, who had stayed at venue also is asked to pay. He argues couple should pay as they invited him to wedding and is now not talking to couple for embarrassing him and making him unwelcome.

Who should pay for the meal?
Who was unreasonable in this situation?
Local friend say they thought they were invited to whole thing, but was late and therefore missed ceremony.

But if you’re not religious you’re looking at a licensed venue or registry office where numbers are restricted.

Hahaha! He is a CF but I think he did it to get back at the couple. Evening invites are rude as hell. Even worse is the trend for invitations that say, 'Come for the ceremony, but then fuck off for a while whilst we host tier A and come back to buy yourself drinks and a sausage roll. Oh, and give us money, too, as a gift.' Local friend should have just declined. I doubt he cares about this friendship anymore.

Our wedding was even more horrific than two tier, it had an A list, a B list and a C list. A was for the registry office; limited to relatives as close as aunts and uncles plus close friends, even then we had people standing at the back. B added in cousins and other friends coming a long way for the reception meal, going from 50 to 70. C was the evening, adding work friends and anyone else local taking it to over 100. Massive buffet in the evening for everyone, ceilidh, cash bar (probably another faux pas). A very standard Scottish wedding nearly quarter of a century ago. I have been to loads of similar weddings all over the place, never been offended by an evening invite.

Exactly, Middle.

As an atheist, it would be a bit of for me to marry in a church, and a bit disrespectful of believers for me to use one just because it was bigger than the register office.

The vows are the most important part of the wedding, everything else is an optional extra. By not inviviting people to the ceremony you are saying that they aren't important enough to witness your vows but are needed for their gift/cash contribution later.

It doesn't have to cost lots to just have one set of guests.

The only place I have ever seen the attitude that an evening invitation is rude is on MN.

Oh, and Local Friend is absolutely in the wrong here

The only place I have ever seen the attitude that an evening invitation is rude is on MN.

To be clear - I've never told a couple that I think them having evening guests is rude, and I have accepted a couple such invitations (and declined a couple more - but actually, contrary to what everyone else has said, I know more people who haven't done this - and all the ones who did had big, flashy, 100 guests plus weddings, so it wasn't about only being able to afford 10 people for the day). I just privately think it!

Pengggwn then I would have a shot load of left out friend and family (which would have meant a fallout) if I were looking at the numbers people are talking about here. I’m fortunate I was able to do the whole day for everyone but I could easily have been in another situation like others.

Maybe it is a Scottish thing and possibly an older generation thing (I am in y 50's) but it was always totally normal for a wedding to consist of all day guests (family and very close friends) then evening invites for other less close friends to come and join the party. I have been to very few weddings which were not arranged like that. I have never felt second best or that anyone was being rude to me if i have been invited to the evening part of a wedding.

n actual fact I have never once been to a wedding where there wasn't day and evening guests

No neither have I. It's the norm in my world. I don't know anyone who didn't have their wedding this way.

In fact if someone just had the same guests there all day and night I'd assume they didn't have many friends so didn't have anyone else to invite. I'd be confused by it and feel a little sorry for them.

I've been to some major weddings, the type with eight bridesmaids and grooms men, and even then there were evening guests. I've also been to some very low cost ones, and again day and evening guests.

I've never met anyone in real life who said "I'm so offended I wasn't invited all day". You'd just think " get out your own arse".

Day/Evening invitations are pretty normal for the rural community that I grew up in. Day invites for friends and family and evening for everyone in the community. No one batted an eyelid at this.

Local friend is in the wrong.

Even if you accept the explanation at face value then losing the invitation with the correct details on was still their responsibility.

However I am somewhat incredulous that a local person managed to be "late" enough to miss the ceremony but early enough to try and crash the reception.

Equally, they must have realised something was amiss when it was obvious they weren't being catered for as part of the "main event".

I can't help but think their explanation is a load of tosh and having booked the hotel to stay overnight, it was always their intention to attend the reception whether in invited or not.

The hotel was to blame, the food should not have been charged to their room without their prior agreement.

The local friend was cheeky though to do this, when his invite made clear what bit of the wedding he had been invited to. Losing the invitation is irrelevant, he must have read it first. His mistake for misunderstanding, not the B&G.

Are you the local friend op?

Evening only invites aren’t rude! What planet are you guys on!

Local Friend was clearly being a CF.

I can't help but think their explanation is a load of tosh and having booked the hotel to stay overnight, it was always their intention to attend the reception whether in invited or not

Yes. This makes sense. Wanted to get his moneys worth so thought he'd turn up anyway and hence asked the friend who he know was going all day for the details and only fronted up after the ceremony, thinking they'd squeeze him in.

I still wouldn't do it. I'd just have a smaller wedding

Then you would have less A list guests and no B lists so essientally snubbing more people rather than less

I'd have just paid for the cheeky friend tbh I do think this is a very English situation...unless he's charged loads to the bill I would just cover it, what's another £20?

I had never heard of day and evening invitations before I read this thread and never been to a wedding where this happened! But it sounds like a perfectly good idea to me. For my second wedding there was no-one at the "ceremony" (actually five minutes in the priest's dining room signing papers) except my two brothers who were there to be witnesses. We then went to my parents' house where DH had arranged a surprise party (I had not expected anyone other than my parents and stepdaughters to be there!).