Time off for planning

Oh gosh that’s so strict! I’ll have been to my venue 3x in total before the wedding, as they’re 2hrs away, so I’ve done it all by email/phone for the most part.
My 3 were the initial viewing in Jan 2022, then a Q&A/general revisit in Jan 2023 (just gone) and then the final meeting planning is likely to be in May, with my wedding July. I’m not doing a 4hr round trip for a 10min meeting, that’s for sure 😂 Both my meetings have been just over an hour, and were on Saturdays.

Maybe see if that’s a real T&C that they have or if it’s just a preference, and then if they’re happy to do most questions by phone or email instead. Given that their business predominantly is anti-social hours, most wedding businesses can be accommodating to a degree.

We had 2 or 3 but could you maybe ask if there is any movement on it? I find it odd they are set to these timings and days. Maybe they could do zoom calls for a couple as you don't actually have to be at the venue for some discussions

As others have said - does it need to be in person?

Alternatively, will your work let you flex your hours? E.g. I've worked 7-3 instead of 9-5 before on odd days that I've needed to leave early for something.

We went to our venue twice after booking. The first one was just to answer a list of questions I had built up and could have been an email. The second was at their request and had to be in person to confirm all the final details.

So far we’ve only been to our venue once (the initial viewing). Our wedding is in just under 8 weeks now and we have 2 more visits planned in: one is a menu tasting so will be in the evening, and the last one will be the final details meeting so again will be a bit longer. Everything else so far we’ve done over the phone or via email, and our coordinator even said we could submit the final details document via email and talk it through over the phone if we couldn’t find a suitable date for the meeting.

Thanks for all the replies it seems 2-3 visits isn't out the normal so might just either send my partner and get him to video call me or book half days for 2 and not lose too much of my holiday. My worry was it would be 5-6 visits