to serve champagne and cake after my wedding ceremony

[spuffy]

I'm getting married in a couple of weeks in a venue with capacity for over 100 so we will be well spread out. We want to serve tea, coffee, a glass of champagne and some (individual) cakes after the ceremony but our venue are now asking us to sign a contract saying we won't serve any food. Is this other people's experience as well? We would have one person serving everyone while they remain seated. AIBU to think that everyone can make an individual risk assessment and decide if they want to eat and drink something after the ceremony rather than the venue dictating to us that we can't serve anything?

@DianaT1969

The advice being offered by posters doesn't seem up to date. The government website says you can hold a wedding reception and serve food and drink to up to 15 people if they remain seated and staff serve. www.gov.uk/government/publications/covid-19-guidance-for-small-marriages-and-civil-partnerships/covid-19-guidance-for-wedding-and-civil-partnership-receptions-and-celebrations Covid levels 1-2 though, not the highest levels.

If the op is planning on serving her own cakes and champagne then she hasn’t booked a wedding reception, but maybe I’ve read the op wrong? Just with the venue saying they want a contract signed to say they won’t serve any food drinks I assumed op was doing it herself.

Alcohol can’t be served in a venue unless with a substantial meal anyway.

Large piece of cake?

You'll probably need to use an alcohol-free champagne

The venue could be fined a lot of money - and I think potentially the duty manager on the day could as well
It's really not fair to do that to them - they've asked you to sign an agreement that you won't serve food, you need to stick to that or find another venue

The OP doesn’t say she is having 100 guests just that the venue can have 100 guests and her guests will be spaced out

I think it’ll either be

1. You’re only allowed to serve food if they venue provide it. (This generally doesn’t apply to wedding cake)
2. You’re not allowed to serve any food as this would be classed as a reception and get the venue into MASSIVE trouble.

Either way I would clarify with the venue what the issue is.
If the former I would argue wedding cakes are exempt (it’s totally standard to bring in a wedding cake from an outside provider), if it’s the later I would accept you can’t have a reception and IF it makes a big difference to you consider offering cake pops or those fancy cake lolly’s as part of the ceremony itself. I’m pretty sure if guests nibble whilst they watch it’s not classed as a reception.

Are you prepared to pay the £10,000 fine the venue will be landed with?

The venue has asked you not to serve food. If you want to serve cake, find another venue.

It’s their choice, not yours.

Have a marvellous wedding and congratulations to you both.

YABVU

You agreed to the venues T&Cs when you booked them. Part of that was no food or drink. So of course you can’t decide to ignore that and serve food and drink!

I am sorry you can't have the day you'd hoped for.

If "individuals making their own risk assessments" was a viable strategy against a disease that thrives on community transmission and therefore affects us collectively not individually, we would never have needed any national measures at all.

It's the venue that will be fined if they break the law, of course they can "dictate" to you that if you want to use their venue you will follow those rules.

Have the reception at your house where, if caught, you’ll be the ones fined and held responsible as it is illegal.

I completely understand why the venue has refused it as they will be liable and why should they bend the rules for you?

I do like the party bag idea.

Film cutting the cake ahead of time and broadcast it on the day by sending video to people's phones) at the end of the ceremony.

I clearly wasn't clear in my first post. I don't understand why this sounds like a windup to someone.
I am in England tier 2 so obviously not having 100 guests.
It's not a registration office so we are allowed to stay for the full half day that we booked.
This was booked a year ago so not serving food was not in the contract at the time.
We wanted to bring our own food and have one person serving it to the others sitting down. I'm not sure if this counts as a reception, I was thinking of it more as a toast.
I'll talk to the venue again and just see if they can clarify if this would put them at risk of a fine. Obviously if it would then we won't serve anything.

After the easing of the national restrictions, venue managers will have discretion over when they consider it safe to open. At that time venues should decide to remain closed or not proceed with receptions or celebrations if they are not able to safely adhere to the guidelines outlined below

www.gov.uk/government/publications/covid-19-guidance-for-small-marriages-and-civil-partnerships/covid-19-guidance-for-wedding-and-civil-partnership-receptions-and-celebrations

Really feel for you OP hope your day is special anyway.

@Besswess88

Really feel for you OP hope your day is special anyway.

Thanks :) I'm sure it will be lovely regardless of whether we can have food or not but it's hard to see so many aspects of the day we had planned slipping away from us. Postponed twice, reduced from 70 to 30 to 15 and now not being able to have any of the little touches we had planned. So fed up with coronavirus!

If you're in England, I think it's tough luck, you can't have one of these right now if it's indoors.

I'd ask for a steep discount if you CAN hold it because the group hails from only 3 different households... if no food/drink is allowed.

In tier two alcohol can only legally be served with a substantial meal.

The venue could have a massive fine and be forced to temporarily close if they allow this

People are being quite rude to you.

‘Tough luck’ ‘you can’t always get what you want’

Pretty sure the OP didn’t want a 15 person masked wedding where you can’t even hug people - the day is probably vastly different to what was planned.

I hope it’s a lovely day and it will be a story to tell in years to come. Best of luck and congrats!

This was easily solvable if you knew how to Google.

This is part of tier 2 guidelines:

"no alcohol to be served at hospitality venues unless with a substantial meal. Last orders at 10pm, closed at 11pm."

You're not paying for a substantial meal, you want to bring your own food in. It's not allowed. Going by that, you'd have to spend more money for a meal and alcohol, assuming that it's a hospitality venue you're getting married in, like a hotel.

If it's not, you're shit out of luck. Either postpone again, put up with it or pay the fine. Your definition of a reception means buffer all. You can call it a toast all you want, it's a reception.

And clearly the venue wouldn’t have stipulated no food or drink in the contract - not sure why people have forgotten how much will have changed since you likely booked!

Bugger all, not buffer all.

Could you bring flasks of mulled wine and cake or mincepies and have them outside? Is that allowed?

If you are tier 2, you can have a wedding reception - so if you want one, you can book somewhere that is happy to seat you all, and as long as everyone eats a substantial meal, they can drink champagne.

You can’t do champagne and cake because it’s not substantial, but it’s not as bad as it could have been, you can have a proper wedding breakfast if you want one.