Final payments

ccvasquez · January 2014

How are you ladies planning on handling final vendor payments? The day of the ceremony? Is someone you trust assigned that task? Do you pay cash or check? Right now I know for sure of one vendor that does not require a deposit, but asked me to pay him in full the day of the ceremony. Is it better to pay vendors in full in advance, or better to pay deposits and some of the fee? Is it better to hold on paying in full in case something happens, so that you are not out of X amount of dollars? Does this mostly depend on the contract? Thanks for your help.

hlvonb · January 2014

ccvasquez said:

How are you ladies planning on handling final vendor payments? We will be paying final payments the day of the wedding. The day of the ceremony? Yes Is someone you trust assigned that task? Right now, we're planning that the Best Man will hand the payments out. We know he can be trusted with it & he said he is more than happy to do it so we don't have to worry about it. We're putting each vendors payments in separate envelopes & we will write the vendors names on the outside of the envelope.
Do you pay cash or check? We will pay with checks. They can be tracked in case a vendor might try and say they never got paid. There's no paper trail with cash. Right now I know for sure of one vendor that does not require a deposit, but asked me to pay him in full the day of the ceremony. Is it better to pay vendors in full in advance, or better to pay deposits and some of the fee? You should do what is best for your budget. If it's better / easier for you to pay part now and the rest later then do that. But remember, whatever you decide to do, ALWAYS get a receipt or something that says you paid so and so X amount on X day and X amount is remaining. Is it better to hold on paying in full in case something happens, so that you are not out of X amount of dollars? Does this mostly depend on the contract? It depends on the contract. All the places we're working with have a part of the contract that talks about what happens if they go out of business, etc. If the contract does not have something like that in it, get something in writing. Thanks for your help.

@ccvasquez

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[Deleted User] · January 2014

It all depends on the contract. My venue required payment two weeks prior to the wedding. My DJ I had to pay in full the week of the wedding. The florist also I had to pay in full I think 1-2 weeks before the wedding. Limo, I paid the day of. Those were the only vendors I had to deal with. I paid everyone by check or credit card except for Limo. I paid them cash (Hubby worked for limo company so they cut us a deal, so basically an off the books deal).Photgrapher I also paid cash (SIL owns studio so similar deal to as limo to use one of her photographers - we wanted her to be a guest, not a worker that day) I did check & CC for same reason other pp posted, way to track payment. Since all vendors were paid in advance (except for limo & photographer) I took care of the envelopes to pay them, and the tips for the DJ, photographer and limo driver. I'm kind of a control freak and would have worried if things were taken care of or not.

princessleia22 · January 2014

Like PP's said, it depends on your contract and then your preferences. I am paying everything in full ahead of time, so that I don't need to deal with it day of. Plus, for budgeting I'm trying to pay things in full as I book them so that I don't have all of those expenses building up to pay at the same time. This way I don't need to worry about making sure all the money is saved or worry about something happening that leaves us short on cash when everything comes due. FI and I plan to handle tips for vendors ourselves day of wedding though.

KatWAG · January 2014

We paid all our vedors in full about 1-2 weeks before the wedding. We paid with credit card when they were accepted and checks otherwise. I wouldnt do cash since you cant trace your payment.

I think we even tipped before the wedding. I didnt want to have to deal with anything that could have been taken care of ahead of time.

kittypolishnbags · January 2014

Mine accepts credit cards and I have a contract. They'll charge a deposit now then half the amount at a closer date and then the rest I'll talk to FI if we're doing it the day after or what not. I think they keep the credit card info on file and if so, they'll just tack the rest on after the event I suppose.

AddieCake · January 2014

All our vendors were paid prior to our wedding day.

HisGirlFriday13 · January 2014

We paid all of our vendors except the classic car driver that DH rented and surprised me with in advance. We paid him, in cash, the day of.

We pre-paid our reception venue and then they billed us for anything we went over what our deposit was, and we ended up owing them less than $400 after the wedding, which was awesome.

Florist, cake lady, DJ -- all paid in advance.

Maggie0829 · January 2014

All of my vendors required full payment approximately 2 weeks prior to our wedding date.

Read over your contracts and see what the requirement is. Even if they allow you to pay them in full the day of I would rather pay them early so it is one less thing that I would have to worry about on the wedding day.

AprilH81 · January 2014

All of our paid vendors required payment in full before the wedding (we are in the process of making final payments now). Our minister (family friend) and pianist (friend) did not ask for payment but we are paying them at the rehearsal dinner.

The only money we will be dealing with the day of will be delivery tips and the DJ tip. I am going to ask our venue coordinator to hand those out the day of since the deliveries will be taking place while we are getting ready.

HobokensFury · January 2014

All of our vendors required payment 2 weeks-10 days before the wedding. The only person we paid day of was the bag piper who was a friend of my cousin's. Honestly I wouldn't want to deal with paying vendors the day of the wedding.

CLI242009 · January 2014

I am with Maggie and HobokenBride - I'd rather not have to deal with the stress of paying the vendors the day.

I'm planning on paying all the vendors in advance. All our vendors say a week to 2 weeks, paid in full but all of them are alright being paid the day of. We are not doing that. We're planning on paying them the rest of their money when we sit down and do our last minute meetings with them.

Only vendors we need to pay for would be my hair and make up stylist. Oh and the driver - his gratuity. All the gratuity for the other vendors we are going to wait and see final products before we decide what tip amount to give each vendor. (Mandatory is of course the reception venue)

Emmy1493 · January 2014

Honestly, we are aiming for several weeks prior. The last thing I want to worry about is if they all got their checks properly. Not that I do not trust my friends/family to help, but it eases my mind knowing it's all paid off.

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