DJ Issues During Reception

musicman216 · October 2018

Hi Everyone,

I was hoping to get a little insight on how to move forward with some issues we had with our DJ vendor for our reception that happened on September 22nd. We signed an agreement with this vendor on May 10, 2017, and over the subsequent 16 months my wife and I had several communications with him via phone/e-mail/in person meetings. We were very impressed with his quick responses to our questions and his promptness when meeting in person, and felt confident that he would help make the 22nd a wonderful day. Upon arriving to the reception hall on the 22nd, we learned from his assistant that he double booked himself and would not be participating in our reception. Not once did he ever mention a scheduling conflict, even the day before when I spoke with him via phone to confirm some minor changes to the script that we had provided to him a month in advance.

His assistant was not prepared for our event, as throughout the first hour, he repeatedly came up to my wife and I with the clipboard asking us questions about what was going on, which made things quite stressful early on and took away from time being spent with friends and family. Besides this there were several other issues which were disappointing:

Assistant wasn't aware of having the receiving line at 5:30; we never received an advanced warning of the timing, and we ended up forming the receiving line ourselves upon discovering that the time was 5:47. The receiving line was very disorganized and the delays impacted the timeline that our caterer had planned for serving the tables. Our caterer, who has extensive wedding experience, was upset and disappointed with how the evening transpired.
There was no music in the room for cocktail hour, which we had previously requested.
While the uplighting was done as we had previously agreed upon; the lighting for the main room was not done as we had planned in the walk-through at the hall. Some of our guests complained about how dark the room was and the difficulty of taking pictures.
The announcing of the bridal party was unacceptable. One of my sisters names was completely wrong (totally different name with the only commonality being the same first initial) and my other sister was announced as Matron of Honor (which she wasn't), both were egregious errors when compared to the form we provided to the DJ a month in advance.
My Best Man's Speech also had multiple issues; on several occasions the microphone cut out and no one but the bridal party could hear what he was saying. Additionally, multiple people told me that they heard a commercial for a car dealership, which I was shocked to hear. I can't think of a reason why a car commercial should be playing at all during our reception.
The assistant and his new assistant weren't very engaging with the audience throughout the evening; our guests who they sat with during dinner even mentioned that they weren't talkative despite several attempts to have conversation with them. We felt that there was a lack of energy coming from them, and there were multiple chunks of time after dinner when there were very few people on the dance floor.

I sent an e-mail to him on Friday the 28th, outlining these issues and stating my disappointment with how everything transpired. In the e-mail I did not specifically state that I wanted some compensation for what transpired, as I was hoping to get some sort of apology and response back and go from there. Last Wednesday, my wife followed up with him via Facebook, and he stated that he did not receive my e-mail, so Saturday night I re-sent my original e-mail. As of this post, I still have not received any response from him.

Any suggestions on how to handle this going forward? Should I be contacting my Chase credit card, since I paid the final bill on the card about two months ago? Should I consider other action?

thisismynickname2 · October 2018

What did your contract say? I recall mine had a clause in there about substitute DJs if the main one couldn't come for certain reasons.

Once you check your contract, you'll have a better idea where to go from there. Double-booking is ridiculous and you should have been told, but no matter what other reason (like, serious illness), the main DJ had a duty to ensure his replacement was well-prepared, and sounds like yours wasn't.

I'm sorry, this really sucks. Let us know about the contract.

climbingsingle · October 2018

musicman216 said:

Hi Everyone,

I was hoping to get a little insight on how to move forward with some issues we had with our DJ vendor for our reception that happened on September 22nd. We signed an agreement with this vendor on May 10, 2017, and over the subsequent 16 months my wife and I had several communications with him via phone/e-mail/in person meetings. We were very impressed with his quick responses to our questions and his promptness when meeting in person, and felt confident that he would help make the 22nd a wonderful day. Upon arriving to the reception hall on the 22nd, we learned from his assistant that he double booked himself and would not be participating in our reception. Not once did he ever mention a scheduling conflict, even the day before when I spoke with him via phone to confirm some minor changes to the script that we had provided to him a month in advance.

His assistant was not prepared for our event, as throughout the first hour, he repeatedly came up to my wife and I with the clipboard asking us questions about what was going on, which made things quite stressful early on and took away from time being spent with friends and family. Besides this there were several other issues which were disappointing:
Assistant wasn't aware of having the receiving line at 5:30; we never received an advanced warning of the timing, and we ended up forming the receiving line ourselves upon discovering that the time was 5:47. The receiving line was very disorganized and the delays impacted the timeline that our caterer had planned for serving the tables. Our caterer, who has extensive wedding experience, was upset and disappointed with how the evening transpired.
There was no music in the room for cocktail hour, which we had previously requested.
While the uplighting was done as we had previously agreed upon; the lighting for the main room was not done as we had planned in the walk-through at the hall. Some of our guests complained about how dark the room was and the difficulty of taking pictures.
The announcing of the bridal party was unacceptable. One of my sisters names was completely wrong (totally different name with the only commonality being the same first initial) and my other sister was announced as Matron of Honor (which she wasn't), both were egregious errors when compared to the form we provided to the DJ a month in advance.
My Best Man's Speech also had multiple issues; on several occasions the microphone cut out and no one but the bridal party could hear what he was saying. Additionally, multiple people told me that they heard a commercial for a car dealership, which I was shocked to hear. I can't think of a reason why a car commercial should be playing at all during our reception.
The assistant and his new assistant weren't very engaging with the audience throughout the evening; our guests who they sat with during dinner even mentioned that they weren't talkative despite several attempts to have conversation with them. We felt that there was a lack of energy coming from them, and there were multiple chunks of time after dinner when there were very few people on the dance floor.
I sent an e-mail to him on Friday the 28th, outlining these issues and stating my disappointment with how everything transpired. In the e-mail I did not specifically state that I wanted some compensation for what transpired, as I was hoping to get some sort of apology and response back and go from there. Last Wednesday, my wife followed up with him via Facebook, and he stated that he did not receive my e-mail, so Saturday night I re-sent my original e-mail. As of this post, I still have not received any response from him.

Any suggestions on how to handle this going forward? Should I be contacting my Chase credit card, since I paid the final bill on the card about two months ago? Should I consider other action?

I'm confused as to what the DJ had to do with the receiving line.

It sucks that he double booked and then didn't prepare his assistant properly. I had issues with my DJ too.

His equipment cut out during our ceremony multiple times. I provided a very detailed play list to them multiple times before our event, and they didn't have it the day of my wedding. I thankfully had a copy with me, but had to run back to my hotel room during the reception to get it. The photo booth didn't come set up like they had explained.

After my event, I just let it go. Things happen. My cake, that was made by the chefs at the resort, collapsed onto the ground as my guests were walking into the dining room. I just rolled with it. At the end of the day, I had an amazing time, regardless of the issues. And my guests did as well.

Were you charged extra for music during the cocktail hour? If so, I'd ask for a refund for that. But the other things - pronouncing a name wrong? Shit happens. You're not going to get money back because a name was pronounced incorrectly. They didn't speak with people while they were eating? So? I don't know that you can really blame them for people not dancing. I've been to weddings where the DJ was very engaged and animated, and people still didn't dance.

So my advice is to let it go and move on.

LondonLisa · October 2018

I would leave a factual and dispassionate review on his facebook/ other social media pages. Only focus on the things that he had control over- ie he double booked your wedding, didn't inform you and sent an unqualified assistant who didn't know the schedule or how to do things. What's worse, your agreed displays and timings were not done and he regularly interrupted the bride to answer questions that had already been fed to the DJ prior to the event. You then tried to contact him 3 times after the event and never responded to your messages.

Ro041 · October 2018

Check your contract. In your communications with him, point out the parts of the contract that he violated. I bet there's a clause that says that he can send someone else if something comes up. Did you pay for the uplighting in the main hall? Did you pay for music during the cocktail hour? If yes, then you are well within your rights to ask for a refund. I agree with @LondonLisa that you should leave a factual review if his answers are not to your satisfaction.

Good luck! That really sucks.

Edit - TK ate the rest of my comment.

Jen4948 · October 2018

Ro041 said:

Check your contract. In your communications with him, point out the parts of the contract that he violated. I bet there's a clause that says that he can send someone else if something comes up. Did you pay for the uplighting in the main hall? Did you pay for music during the cocktail hour? If yes, then you are well within your rights to ask for a refund. I agree with @LondonLisa that you should leave a factual review if his answers are not to your satisfaction.

Good luck! That really sucks.

Edit - TK ate the rest of my comment.

Cosigned.

banana468 · October 2018

Ditto the others. Check your contract and what is itemized. If there are itemized items that you are charged for that did not happen then be clear what should be refunded.

Poor service is something that should get a poor review but if it's done to the contract there may not be much you can do about it.

charlotte989875 · October 2018

I think you should focus on separating things that were unfortunate and disappointing from things you paid for and weren’t done. For example, it’s unfortunate they didn’t pronounce names correctly and that there were some issues with the mics. This is different than paying for a service (music at cocktail) and not having that fulfilled (presuming this was part of a package and documented in the contract).

It may be disappointing that the timing was off for catering, but was their a coordinator relaying info to all the vendors? Events don’t always run perfectly on schedule and these things can happen. Also, if they were asking you questions, sure that’s annoying, but if they don’t know what’s happening in the moment would you rather them not ask and have them just assume (possibly incorrectly)?

But if you did pay for specific services that were not delivered, or if the contact said the specific DJ would be there then I think you have some options. You can reach out again and outline, in detail, with specifics, how and where the contract was not fulfilled and ask for a partial refund.

I would absolutely not go to your CC company and dispute the charge because they did provide you a service and you could be responsible for falsely reporting fraud on your card. You can’t file a claim just because you didn’t like the services. You did authorize the charge on your card and when you file a claim you declare that you did not authorize the charge (which you did); you’re just unhappy. The CC company could contact the vendor/do an investigation as to whether the charge was fraudulent and you can find yourself in legal trouble. Again, this is not the right way to go about it.

MesmrEwe · October 2018

Yep - what the others have said - check your contract! Then - stick to the things that were promised and not delivered (I.e. if you paid an upcharge to have certain things done and they weren't - back it up with images if possible like the uplighting missing, etc.) as those are the things you can negotiate. Services paid for and not delivered (he sent a subordinate, not himself whom was promised and the subordinate did a horrible job).. And, instead of communicating through email, PHONE and document.. Then, if you can come to an agreement, great, if not, go ahead and do the Google reviews about the botched event.

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