Venue & Cancellation advice please (WP related)

I dont understand - are you saying you wanted to cancel the venue but keep hotel rooms there?

x

I don't understand.

You booked another venue and requested your deposit back from venue one, why would you not want them to cancel the room? Or is it the guest rooms that are the problem?

Sorry if it wasn't clear.

They don't know we have booked another venue, as far as they are concerned we are still holding the wedding there, I simply rang and asked if we did cancel would we get the deposit back (explaining the reasons why)

I then repeated what had been said on the phone into an email to the events manager.

I'm still confused, why does it matter if you are having the wedding somewhere else? Surely you would want to cancel the first venue?

Well we do, but we haven't told them that. That bit is irrelavant really.

I just didnt think they would be able to cancel everything without our say so, whether it be verbal or written

I too am confused. Like the venue, I would interpret someone asking for their deposit back as a cancellation. Or are you asking about the guest rooms - did you book those or did your guests? If the guests has booked them, I would have thought the venue would need to check with them before cancelling.

Because we are trying to get our deposit back from the 1st venue.

We were told if we did cancel they would re sell the facilities and get our money back (this is in the contract) this is where the arguement lies, they are saying we won't get the deposit back.

We were advised not to cancel as it would give us more "bargaining power" and increase the chances of us getting the deposit back.

If we cancel now they have 12 months to re book it, whereas if we dont cancel till may they have only 3 months to cancel it.

I would imagine that there is something in the contract which states that they can cancel the booking, without your consent, but they would have to notify you of this.

That's how I'm reading it.

But surely there is more chance of them being able to re-sell the date the more notice you give them and therefore more chance of you getting your deposit back.

Yes, but they have said that whether they re sell it or not they won't give it us back

Who told you the bit in bold? A legal adviser? It doesn't make any sense to me that you don't want the first venue to be cancelled if the contract clearly states that you will get your money back if you cancel. Likewise if you don't cancel, surely they don't have to give the deposit back as they're still holding the rooms for that.

Wordsworth, yes a solicitor.

The contract states;

“ CANCELLATIONS ~ In the unfortunate circumstance of having to cancel your confirmed booking at any time prior to the event the company will make every effort to resell the facilities on your behalf.”

We also had this confirmed verbally. They are now saying this is not the case as that partiular clause doesn't mention the deposit, it only mentions "the facilities"

I agree, if we don't cancel they don't have to give it us back, but they have told us we won't get it back if we cancel.

So, as far as the venue is concerned, you made an enquiry saying "If we were to cancel, would we get the deposit back?" and on the strength of that enquiry, they cancelled? When you have to give written notice to cancel?

I'd be hopping mad if somewhere did that to me. As far as they know, you haven't definately decided to cancel at that stage, and they should be working out what's wrong so they can keep your business, not cancelling on you! They could have left you with a real problem by doing that!

The fact that you already have another venue means you don't have a huge problem, but that's not relevant as far as the venue is concerned...

I think the contract means the venue can resell the rooms and recoup the money. It is usual that deposits are not refundable, no?

However, if they have "mis-sold" something to you, then surely it won't matter when the cancellation is made, if you have a case for a refund I'd just make it. If they stick on the deposit, and you feel your case is strong, you can always take them to small claims court.

Right I think I understand this now - basically you want your deposit back as you are cancelling the original venue. What does it say in the contract about this? If you give X months notice do you get a full/partial refund? Or does it say it is a nonrefundable deposit?

If the former and it stipulates that with notice you can retrieve your deposit then they haven't got a leg to stand on, there's plenty of time so there shouldn't be an issue.

If the latter then obviously they aren't legally obliged to give you anything - is this why you mentioned the rooms? Are you looking for ways to try and prove that their dealings with you have been less than 100% satisfactory?

When we booked we were told a couple of things by the wedding co ordinator, which i spoke to the hotel about around 2 weeks ago and those things now turn out not to be true (that wedding co ordinator has now left so the hotel say "there is nothing we can do")

What i wanted to get out of the email was clarification of what i had been told on the phone. I actually wrote in the email that this wasn't us cancelling it.

Yes, RachelHS, that is my point

OK I think I understand now. What does the contract say about deposits, it's usual to have a non-refundable deposit isn't it?

I think your argument should be based around why you think you were mis-sold and possibly go to the small claims court if you feel you have a strong case.

Without seeing the exact wording of what you said when you asked about the refund of your deposit, it's hard to say if it could have been seen as you wanting to cancel.

I suppose I can see the venue's POV in that from the above, I would have assumed I wasn't going to get the deposit back on cancellation unless it could be resold. Was it verbally stated that the deposit would be repaid and that was the case even if it was not resold? I'm still a bit confused by what you're actually trying to achieve if I'm honest, but at least you're taking legal advice on it. They'll have a better idea than me.

In the contract is doesn't actually mention the deposit, we did ask the then co ordinator about this and she said the depsosit would and could be returned if they could re sell the room to another wedding.

yes that is why i mentioned the rooms, because as far as they know i don't actually have another venue

MH, we wanted to cancel it but our solicitor advised us not to, it does feel like we are being awkward.

We have nothing in writing about getting the deposit back.

I suppose I can see the venue's POV in that from the above, I would have assumed I wasn't going to get the deposit back on cancellation unless it could be resold. Was it verbally stated that the deposit would be repaid and that was the case even if it was not resold? I'm still a bit confused by what you're actually trying to achieve if I'm honest, but at least you're taking legal advice on it. They'll have a better idea than me

It was verbally stated that we would only get the deposit back if the room was re sold. Which they are now telling us in't the case.

What we are trying to achieve is getting our #1000 back

So you've been advised not to cancel until you have your deposit back!? How can the venue return your deposit upon cancellation if you're refusing to cancel. I just don't get it. Surely you need to cancel before you expect your deposit back. I can't see what bargaining power this gives you.

We have been advised not to cancel it until they agree we will get it back if the room is re sold.

Ok, so how are you going to proceed? Are you going to ask them to reinstate the booking? I think you'll have more luck by being up-front with them. I would write another email explaining that you were unhappy with the way the original co-ordinator sold the venue to you and explain that since the venue couldn't help (as the original co-ordinator left) you felt that you had no option but to take your business elsewhere.

Then ask them to re-consider their decision not to refund the deposit and ask them to try and re-sell the date in order that they may be able to refund your deposit.

You are much more likely to solve this if you are professional about the whole thing. Don't let emotion enter into it. I'm unsure about your solicitors advice to keep the booking in place however as I can't see how that would give you any bargaining power?

ETA: I wonder whether there is more to this than meets the eye. What exactly did the original co-ordinator agree to that the venue now won't honour?

I'm a bit confused as to why you are getting a solicitor involved but ...

I would have thought that if you are trying to negotiate that you get your deposit back if they resell, then giving them the maximimum amount of notice to resell would work in your favour - given they have already cancelled your booking and you have other arrangements in place, it does rather seem to me that you have limited room to negotiate unless they do resell and then they are not out of pocket and so neither should you ?

There could be other problems arise from this as well - if there is no agreement of cancellation by both parties then if they have to hold the booking open they cant even begin to try and resell it / you could be liable for additional costs as often there is a sliding scale of penalties depending on how near date the cancellation is made.

You may be better confirming you no longer wish to hold wedding there - detail reasons re misselling -and try an negotiate with will happen with deposit. If you have solicitor involved is this costing you even more money?

This happens an awful lot with venues, there's such a high turnover of staff and anything agreed verbally doesn't stand. I think you will struggle to get the deposit back. Generally deposits and always non refundable and that extract of the contract doesn't state you get the deposit back. I think the best thing you can do it appeal to their good nature. Often if the venue can re-book the rooms they will give the deposit back as a gesture of good will. Afterall, they haven't lost anything. You have a far better chance of them selling it with a lot of notice.

What do you feel they mis-sold to you? That may be a better point of attack. If they stated something that was a blatant lie then you'd have a better chance with that than anything else.

I meant to mention the cancellation charges too. The closer the date you have booked gets the more money the venue could ask you to pay. At the place I work, if you hadn't confirmed final numbers a month prior to the event we would issue an invoice for all the pre-booked facilities based on the numbers on your contract.

This is why I don't understand the reasons behind keeping the booking intact even though you have no intention of using the venue for your wedding. Potentially, you'll just end up owing lots more money.

Speaking as someone who put herself (and Hitched!) through so much [unnecessary] stress regarding her wedding venue, including cancelling a venue and re-booking elsewhere...

I'd say let it go, cancel venue 1, forget about the deposit and move on.

I don't let things go easily at all, I'm like a pitbull when I have my "I'm in the right" hat on but honestly, weddings are stressful enough. Your posts have left me so confused so I can only imagine you are also confused!

We lost about £2,500 in deposits taking into account the money we'd already paid the venue, catering and toilet hire people and although it was money we couldn't afford to loose our mental state was much more valuable.

That said, we'd changed our minds because the type of wedding it was becoming was too stressful not because the venue had let us down - I was spending hours stressing over hiring cutlery and crockery and fairground rides and it was all getting way out of control so we cancelled the house and marquee and over the top catering and all the [looking back] naff stuff and booked a lovely old barn instead...had a much more spectacular wedding in that it wasn't the naff wanna be footballers wife do I'd have ended up with ?

If the hotel has cancelled the booking, then they should pay back the deposit. If you (B&G) cancel, then as I understood it, a company can only keep a deposit to cover their costs. If they book another wedding for that night, then they haven't lost anything and should return your deposit.

The wording you've stated here doesn't mention deposit, I don't read that as getting deposit back, I read that as they will make every effort to resell the facilities so that you are not obliged to fulfil the remainder of the contract i.e. pay for all the facilities - that would probably kick in closer to the time e.g. if you were to cancel a month beforehand, they could ask for more than just the deposit.

I don't think you've got much going in your favour trying to get the deposit back because a member of staff said so - you signed the contract and that's in black and white.

However, if you have been mis-sold something, or something is not as per the contract, I would have thought you stood more of a chance. But I would have thought it depends on whether or not you've given the venue a chance to put it right, and it sounds like you haven't - although you may have done and just not put that in your OP.