is it normal not to hear from people??? a lil rant...

chrysti10 · August 2010

I just don't get it. We sent out save the dates 5 months before the wedding. It has been the topic of family discussion, yet we still haven't heard from some people. We sent out invites the end of june with a deadline of august 5 (tomorrow). We have yet to hear from about 95-100 people (our guest list was 270). Is this a normal statistic? I knew i wouldn't hear from some people, but thats more than a third! we started calling and emailing people over the weekend because we had only heard from about 100 people at that time. The majority of these people are my fiance's family. its sooooo frustrating because his "family" was the one that wanted us to have a wedding here and we couldn't invited a lot of friends because the guest list started out at 400 with his family! now its looking like we will only have about 130 at the wedding with people that are unable to attend and those that haven't responded. which is good on the money part, but frustrating because of all the money we have spent for other this to accomadate a larger party.

is his family lame or is this normal?

There will be assigned seating so its not like they can just crash it.

should we continue to bug people? theres one family group that lives 8-10 hours away and still "dont' know" if they will be attending! How do they not know!?!?!?! this is something you make plans for! Another family member told her that she wasn't sure because of her financial situation and would let us know aug 18! /> />> o I already told her that was unacceptable.
am I in the wrong for thinking they had enough warning about this! ARRRRGGG

ok i could keep going..... but i'll stop....... would love your input on this situation

frogurt814 · August 2010

When does your venue need a final count for dinner? I would keep trying to get in contact with people until then.

I only had about 10 - 15 people not RSVP out of the 200+ that we invited.

mysticl · August 2010

You are probably going to have alot of people drop the RSVP in the mail tonight and tomorrow. Sometimes that date gets interpreted as the date to mail it by, not the date you want to receive it by.

nicholestranz · August 2010

I went through the same thing, about half of our guests did not reply or even send the RSVP back. We waited a week after the due date and called everyone that had not replied. The majority of the comments were "Of course were coming". Like i'm supposed to know if your coming or not without the RSVP. It was extremely irritating. It's a step by step process and if i can't figure out who's coming then everything else stops. Seating arrangements, Head count for caterer etc... I know how you feel!!

hz80408 · August 2010

Like pp said, you should probably give it a week until after the RSVP for the stragglers, then start calling.

chrysti10 · August 2010

thanks so much for your input. I thought that we would have about 30-40 not reply and had planned on calling those people.... but almost 100! EEEEKKKK

we have already started calling and messaging people as of last week and still people aren't responding to the emails or phone calls or they are telling us "maybe, i don't know yet" The thing that really bothers me is that there were so many people we "had" to invite and my fiance didn't even know half these people or didn't know their kid's name or that they were married or not! I understand if your close to certain family members, that an RSVP could be assumed, but when you haven't talked to them in years its a different situation.

We didn't have postcards. we told people to RSVP online or call us and gave them two phone numbers. If i would have done postcards, i probably would have had less response. I just don't understand how hard it is to pick up a phone! and like i said in the other post, most of these people are out of town (4-9 hours away) don't you think that people should have arrangements by now!? I mean do they even have time off work or hotels booked? erggg.... like i said earlier.... i could go on and on and on..... lol

Noellesmama · August 2010

How annoying! Im afraid the same thing will happen to us!

But this will be from my side of the family...my mom is insitant on inviting all these cousins..3rd, 4th & beyond. When we invite them, we won't really know until they show up the day of the wedding. What?!? So I am most likely not doing seating arrangements. I may do reserved tables for people that I know that will be there, that have RSVP'd.

Sapphire1002 · August 2010

I know you're concerned with the assigned tables/seating and to have everyone accounted for. Chances are, even if you do suddendly have a high response rate, there will inevitably be a number of guests who don't RSVP, but show up, RSVP yes, but don't show up, etc. I think to handle the firset part, just have a separate table(s) for "non-responders" and they'll have a place..take care of what you can with the assignments.

aflenyo · August 2010

I sent out 50 invites early July with August 12th as a due date for RSVP. I have received probably 10 responses. I was wondering if I was the only one getting annoyed by this. Almost all of my guests are coming from out of town, I also think they should know by know if they are coming or not. Its a simple yes or no.

quotequeen · August 2010

We didn't have postcards. we told people to RSVP online or call us and gave them two phone numbers. If i would have done postcards, i probably would have had less response. I just don't understand how hard it is to pick up a phone!

I disagree. Not having RSVP cards makes responding seem less important. Also, calling is more of a pain than dropping a pre-stamped, pre-addressed card in the mail. I personally hate calling people on the phone.

You really shouldn't be bothering people about not responding until after the deadline has actually passed, even though it's a lot of people. As for the people who are saying they don't know yet, or they will tell you later, figure out the deadline of when you really need to know, and tell them that if you don't hear from them by X date, you will have to assume they are not coming because you have to turn your final numbers in to the caterer.

banana468 · August 2010

When people don't respond by the appropriate date, it really is annoying.

All you can do is call and see what they say. Then if you don't get a definite response, say something like, "I understand that you can't make it and we really do need a definite answer so unfortunately we'll put you down as not attending hopefully we can get together after the wedding."

This is if the people keep putting you off. You don't have to accept maybe answers (with very few exceptions) but give them a bit of time to respond.

Lisa8888 · August 2010

It is unusual to not hear from so many people. By not having RSVP cards, you have contributed to this problem. Its very easy for a guest to fill out a RSVP card and put it in the mail. But it is not as easy for a guest to have to telephone or email. A guest may feel awkward about telephoning and having to offer an explanation of why they are not attending. Same thing with email. It puts an additional burden on the guest.

If you have telephoned or emailed guests and they still have not responded, you should assume that they are not coming.

is it normal not to hear from people??? a lil rant...

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