To cancel a wedding abroad that 40 guests have paid to attend?

[Justwondering82]

We are due to get married abroad in March next year. So far we have only paid the deposit for the venue, remaining balance not due until January. However our 40 guests have paid for their package holidays to attend, some have only paid deposits and some have paid full balances.

The only reason I want to cancel is because I don't think it's going to happen. With covid, the possibility of a second wave and social distancing etc I just do not realistically see how it will go ahead. We were having the wedding next year and buying a house the year after, but we've got enough sat in our savings for either a house deposit or the wedding. A house has come up that we love, it's in the perfect location and is just everything we want. We can't get the house and not cancel/postpone the wedding as we wouldn't have enough left in savings to cover both if the wedding was to go ahead. We would ideally want to postpone the wedding, but god knows the long term impact this will have on travel especially for a large group of us. We don't want to be impacted by social distancing either. I'd rather cancel and just see how the next few years pan out?

What do I do?

Sorry but you don’t know what’s going to happen, and actually you can now go on holiday so your wedding could probably take place. So people may not get their money back because YOU changed your mind.

You have to decide now if you don’t want it to go ahead, and be prepared to reimburse those that can’t get their money back because YOU changed your mind

Don’t go blaming Covid for this

The OP isn't cancelling the wedding! Why don't posters RTFT??!!

Sorry OP I've seen you've updated since I started typing!!! This shit moves fast!! I don't know how to delete the post so...sorry again.

Good luck to you and your husband to be!

Op I would be fuming if you were my family. I think it's the height of rudeness to do this and you need to give your head a wobble

@ballsdeep

Just read the thread, the wedding is GOING AHEAD!! Why are there so many posters who don't???

[quote Mittens030869]@ballsdeep

Just read the thread, the wedding is GOING AHEAD!! Why are there so many posters who don't???[/quote]

@TheStuffedPenguin

Perhaps now you realise how stupid it is to have a "dream wedding" when you can't afford a house but I think it is totally wrong for you to do this to all your guests !

Couldn’t agree more. It’s like the priorities are all wrong.

I struggle to believe you could even contemplate cancelling your wedding in these circumstances so you could buy the house.

If you could, then you are utterly appalling.

And if you've changed your mind in the interim then fine, but don't expect any praise for it. It's only what a decent person would have done without question in the first place.

You can't cancel and leave your guests who have paid to go in the lurch. That would be appalling. You have to reimburse them. Your event is the reason that expense was incurred. They might have built on a few days for themselves around it, but you choice of destination and their subsequently accepting your invitation was the primary cause of the costs they've incurred. And how would you feel of someone did that to you?

Please don’t do this. We are out of pocket by £1500 as the wedding we were meant to be attending this September in Italy has been cancelled because the bride ‘wouldn’t be getting the wedding she’d dreamed off’. Which is fine but the hotel won’t give us our money back as they are open and insurers won’t pay out either. Worst, our flight have now cancelled by the airline and flight prices are now more than double what we paid to rebook with another airline. To say I’m annoyed is an understatement.

I really feel for you, OP. We've moved our wedding from this year to next spring/summer and at this point it just feels really abstract, so I can imagine how the house is really tempting. Is there any way you could scale down some of the wedding so that you could free up some house deposit money or has it all been agreed?

Good on you meanwhile for taking on board what others have said here. Our insurance company is refusing to refund the flights for our honeymoon even though they couldn't go ahead, so unfortunately I would be concerned your guests might not get a refund if you did cancel.

i get youve accepted you were wrong op im just wondering why you think its inevitable that it will be cancelled-we have no idea whats going to happen in 8 weeks time let alone 8 months

I am glad you have got a head wobble. It is more than well deserved. You have no bloody idea if flights/holidays will be cancelled in March or not but was willing to leave your guests massively out of pocket. You need to take this as a massive learning moment.

And if this is a reverse, I am so sorry that you have such a greedy/self entitled person in your life, I advise you cut them out of your life and move on.

Jesus Christ, some people just love an excuse to be horrible don't they! I'm not appalling, disgusting or so on and so forth. I had a doom and gloom mindset that it was going to be cancelled anyway so might as well get the house. I got a kick up the bum and am slightly more hopeful it might go ahead now. A pandemic was hardly something we'd planned for, it's hard to get excited for something you think isn't going to happen, maybe I did just want it to go away so I could stop feeling anxious that it'll be ruined. There we go, sue me. I hadn't mentioned it to a soul, I posted on here because I obviously had doubts about the idea. I listened. This is a shitty stressful time.

If you are that miserable with your own life that you mock someone for calling something their dream then so be it, but I really don't see why you'd take the time to comment purely because of that. This is my dream wedding. When in my life will I ever get the chance to be spend two weeks on a Caribbean island with all of my nearest and dearest? Let people be excited about things for gods sake.

Also I'm not an idiot spending money I don't have on a wedding when I can't even afford a house. We have every penny we need for the wedding already. We have some left over, but when we did the budget we worked out it'll take until late 2021/early 2022 to get the house. I wanted the wedding first, I want to be married when we sign for a house. My priorities are just fine thank you, we decided what is best for us.

fair enough op hope it all goes ahead

@Justwondering82 seriously get the thread deleted. There will be a shit ton more idiot posters who will come along and don't read your posts before replying and you'll constantly be berated and riled up. And that's not even counting the trolls, just the idiots who like to shoot off their mouths before gaining full context of a situation. Save yourself the hassle and get @MNHQ to delete it.

You’d ruin your future wedding by doing so. If you have any friends left let alone guests they’d have a bitter taste in their mouth. You’d taint the home you bought with the money as people would start seeing through your lies and begrudge your lack of transparency. Stick with it and it’ll be fine . Cancel and i can pretty much guarantee you will be in for an inevitable rough ride and misery 😂

Oops i thought this was only one page long !!!

SORRY I HAVE NOT READ TFT ... in probably still right though .. I mean.. select comments as appropriate 😂🙈

I’d say the wedding would go ahead by March, it seems you want to cancel because of the house and are using COVID as an excuse. It’s crap to cancel needlessly when people have already paid.

RTFT

THE OP IS NOT GOING TO CANCEL!!

SHE ASKED A QUESTION. SHE GOT THE ANSWER(S). SHE HAS LISTENED!! (UNLIKE MOST OF YOU!)

and

If the thread is still live then people are allowed to comment on it!

I don't know why people are surprised.

Destination weddings, especially ones on expensive Carribbean islands, are only booked by people who don't care about other people's situations anyway. As long as they get their dream.

@Justwondering82 Where are you getting married? My sister is travelling over to a wedding in Barcelona in only a couple of weeks! Of course we can’t predict the future, as we’ve seen, but I’d feel fairly confident about your March 2021 wedding going ahead