Qu Do you care that you put some people you invite in financial difficulty, so you can have the wedding you want?

[5068TLM]

This is an open question. It covers hen and stag do price tags for people attending those, as well as the cost to people who attend the wedding as well. Think your wedding guests and your wedding party when answering.

Please give reasons for your opinions. Thank-you for your time.

Depends how much you want them there. I wouldn't go if I couldn't afford it. If they kicked up a fuss tough luck.

Only just starting to think about planning, but we know we want our nearest and dearest there and so of course we will plan with that in mind, trying to make sure that our wedding is enjoyable for those that make it. It won’t be Maui and there will be no requirements to chip in for the venue or pay for our honeymoon or whatever. We’ll provide plenty of good food as a priority, and as much booze as we can stretch to (doubt it’ll be a free bar since there’s certain guests on my side who could bankrupt us singlehandedly, but there will be a decent amount provided) and won’t insist on guests wearing certain colours or fancy dress or whatever.

Ultimately though, there’s nowhere we could hold a wedding that at least some guests wouldn’t have to travel to, that’s just geography of where people live. Outfits (if guests choose to buy something new), petrol, taxi or accommodation, stopping off for a drink on the way etc - there’s going to be some costs involved like there is for any day/night out. If people can’t afford it and choose not to attend I’d be sad and they’d be missed, but I’d understand.

It’s like any invitation you receive or planned event surely? You find out what’s involved and if you can’t afford it or can’t attend for whatever other reason you politely decline.

Er no. It's an invite, not a summons. It's up to the invitee to decide if they can afford to attend or not.

Well I wouldn't book anything extortionate but surely if it was going to put them in such financial difficulties they could just not attend?

If we can’t afford to attend a wedding then we don’t go. We won’t put ourselves in financial difficulty for it. Surely most people would do the same?
We went to a wedding last weekend that cost us in the region of £600. We’ve been putting money aside for it. If we couldn’t have afforded it the bride and groom wouldn’t have been offended, they knew it was a big ask.
We’ve been invited to a wedding next year in Canada. We can’t afford it so we’re not going.

People really need to stop enabling this type of entitled OTT behaviour by not attending. Just decline the invitation and do something else. As for your brother or someone close to you expecting you to spend £££ you don't have on their wedding or hen/stag do's, no excuse. Tell them you can't afford it if you can't. We had to with my h's brother.

We didn't expect people to put themselves in financial difficulty for our wedding. We didn't want hen parties but our friend offered their house for a party, another friend provided music and a third food and games. It was joint, just a chance to see people before the big day. If they hadn't offered we wouldn't have bothered, it wasn't important to us, although it was lovely. I may have bought some home spa stuff and had a night with my mam and sister and a takeaway maybe.

I paid for all bridesmaids dresses, shoes, jewellery and hair. I didn't pay makeup because two of the bridesmaids are very into makeup, one wears some but is more alternative and one hardly ever wears any. I said they could either do their own/each others, or I could help, or they could hire someone who suited their style. I only wanted them to be comfortable, didn't have a particular look. I took my full makeup kit, I did natural makeup for the one who never wears any. My sister did her own. The other two chose to pay someone to do theirs. I love their makeup because they all look like themselves, even in matching dresses.

We booked a local venue, day and evening there, offered rooms if people wanted them but plenty close enough to get taxis home if people preferred, or some had designated drivers. No colour scheme for guests, no dress code, we were more than happy for people to wear whatever they felt good in. We had no expectation of gifts, no gift list or cutesy little poem asking for money (can't stand them). People were coming to help us celebrate, not to buy us stuff. We had a late wedding with food after, there was a bar but we aren't big drinkers so people's choice if they wanted any, we provided drink for toasts etc.

I would be very upset if people felt they were expected to spend money they couldn't afford to be there. One bridesmaid travelled down because we met in uni so don't live close, I would have paid for her room and petrol if she couldn't have because I wanted her there.

It's a bit of a daft question, really.

Most reasonable people care if they put their friends and family in financial difficulty.

Some people will have weddings that their friends and family might not be able to attend (or attend all of - hen, stag, etc).

In that case, decline - and if the bride and groom have an issue with it, so be it.

Please give reasons for your opinions.

Yes Sir.

Please give reasons for your opinions. Thank-you for your time

I would try and keep the cost of things as low as possible as I wouldn't want any of my close friends or family not to come because they can't afford it. That being said if it's my wedding then I will be paying as much as I can afford so if there's no transport for guests or an open bar that's because my budget won't allow it so I would hope that wouldn't put anyone off. X

That's a goady title!

To snswer re my wedding;
Hen party I have tailored to suit the people I wanted to invite. I wanted lots of people so we are doing it locally.
Wedding had to be organised around school holidays which them limited our venue choices and budget. We wanted close family anyone else would be a bonus.
We are however the fourth poorest couple out of our invited friends. This is more problematic than you think in terms of expectations.

In general though how can you tell who will be put in financial difficulty? A destination wedding could be cheaper a the poorer single guest who only has to pay for a budget flight and who is sharing a room and a lift to the airport. Whilst a more affluent family, who needs to buy new passports for the kids, 5 flights and two hotel rooms could find it too much.
A UK wedding might break the poorer single guest without a car, who has to pay for an expensive long train journey and taxi rides from the station.

How can you say unless the wedding is £1,000's to attend ( in which case I think B&G are inviting people for cash presents)

Have the wedding you want but don't get pissed off if people decline the invitation because of cost.

The issue is when people are unreasonable in their expectations of what people should pay (eg expensive destination wedding) AND then have a tantrum if everyone they want there doesn't go.

Personally the people that are celebrating with us are far more important than all the normal wedding nonsense, but to some people the Social Media view of their wedding is more important and that's OK (different strokes and all that)

My OH and I are from different countries (currently living in his), and our guests are more or less evenly split between his country and mine. Whichever country we chose to get married in, 50% of the guests would have to travel from abroad to attend. That's not something that we could get round unless we had two separate weddings, which we didn't want to do.

We chose to get married where we live, and where a large number of our friends and my OH's family live. I am glad that for those people the cost of attending the wedding will be minimal. As for those travelling from the UK, I am hugely grateful that nearly everyone we have invited is coming, and that they all seem to be pretty excited about it. Only one person has mentioned the cost of attending, which is my aunt. OK, she and my uncle are paying for themselves and their three children to attend, so it will cost a lot. But at the same time, they have massively faffed around and waited until the last minute to book their travel and accommodation, so they have made things worse for themselves than they really needed to be.

We do not have a gift list because I don't think people should be obliged to spend even more money on us after already having paid so much to attend.

If anyone can't attend due to money, we will not make an issue of it.

People will be properly fed and watered all night and there is an open bar so no question of people having to pay for their own drinks on top of everything else.

We live in a popular travel destination so quite a few people are planning to spend a few days and make a holiday of it.

I told my bridesmaids I wanted to have the hen do in London so that nobody is having to travel abroad twice (once for the hen do and once for the wedding) and they were under strict instructions to keep the cost of accommodation and activities down as much as possible.

In short, yes it matters. We want to make it as easy as possible for people to attend, and we want to make sure that those who have made a huge effort to get here have a fantastic time and a night to remember. It is going to be expensive for some people but we have done the best we can.

When we got married we originally wanted to do it in Portugal or Italy but one of my brothers has three kids, who were all under 6 at the time. We didn't want to ask him to pay out huge money to bring them away for our wedding so we stayed home and did it here instead. We had fabulous weather and a great day... So it all worked out for the best!

It's an invitation, not a summons!

But yes, I think it is helpful to have a range of price points if you are putting out an accommodation list, including very budget ones.

You can't do much about cost of transport, to nearest major hub, but may need to help co-ordinate shared taxis or lifts beyond that. And of course need to provide transport (or check everyone has sorted out lifts) if people need to drive between different parts of the day. But that's just normal looking after of guests, as you would when hosting any event. Just because a wedding tends to have more guests does not absolve you from looking after them.

How many words do we have to write?

Do you care that you put some people you invite in financial difficulty, so you can have the wedding you want?
No.
Please give reasons for your opinions.

1. If they loved me they'd pay.
2. I don't like any of my guests and want to see them suffer.
3. I would be gutted if they had a nice time at my expense, so I'm going to make them pay through the nose. And then make them pay some more for a vast number of disappointing, expensive experiences.
4. I hate the environment so I want loads of disposable tat that has to be paid for somehow.
5. OMG I totally hate their kids too.

Is that the sort of thing you're looking for OP?

What an odd thread. People should have the wedding they wish and guests should decide to attend or not. As a pp said it's an invite not a bloody summons.

I care but I wouldn't dream of arranging any of the kinds of OTT things that might lead to it.

Obviously if things are very tight, any kind of invitation that involves travel could be out of reach, in which case I'd be disappointed but understand they couldn't come.

What does annoy me, for all events, not just weddings is when people say they can't afford to come whilst splashing the cash all over the place for other things. Obviously people can choose how they spend their money and if they don't want to come that's fine, but say that rather than blaming me for arranging an unaffordable do when it's clearly not the case

People really need to stop enabling this type of entitled OTT behaviour by not attending

What. 🤣 people shouldn't feel entitled to have the wedding they wish?

You know there's a media request section dontcha OP?

I'm not a media person, and I'm not writing a piece, (or getting others to write one for me) as another user suggested.

I just wanted to know if it bothers other people as much as it bothers me, not to demand too much from people who have their own priorities in life. Thanks to the people who replied who have organised their weddings and highlighted how they made decisions, it's helped, and to those who replied to tell me they keep a level head and if it's unaffordable they are strong enough to decline.

I asked for people to explain, so I wouldn't infer or assume anything. I'm not sure why some people found that so taxing, that they had to troll the thread with pointless responses, but each to their own.

We've said:

• no gifts
• smart casual dress code and to please not buy anything specially for the wedding
• bring your own drinks (to avoid paying bar prices)
• no wedding party (no bridesmaids etc)
• no stag or hen do, but we're inviting people round to ours a few weeks beforehand

We're also having a short wedding and reception so that even those travelling a distance can get there and back in a day off they need to.