What Time do you put on your invites??

We aren't doing evening invites as everyone is coming to the whole thing so I'm not too sure, but on our day invites I put the time of the wedding - everyone should know that they need to be there before that.

Put the actual time of the wedding on there. People will arrive early - apparently the majority of our guests were there half an hour early - and if you effectively make them sit around for an extra half an hour by telling them the wrong time, they won't be happy. If you really want to make sure, you can put "Please arrive by 1.15 for a 1.30 ceremony" or something similar.

For our evening guests, we gave them a time of 6.30. We planned to have the first dance then, but in the end we were running a bit late so had a bit of time to mingle before moving everyone into the hall for the first dance.

We've been told that we need guests to arrive an hour before the ceremony - so I'll be putting something like

"We ask for guests to arrive at the venue for 1pm, for a 2pm ceremony"

If I got a wedding invite saying 1pm I'd arrive at about **** for a 1pm service. If I then found out it was a 1.30pm service I'd be a bit miffed at sitting around bored for an hour.

We sent out an info sheet with ours, specifying that if people are late they will not be admitted to the ceremony (because of the layout of the venue), and what time to arrive if they wanted to see us arrive in our posh car. The evening invites say 7pm, that when people are supposed to arrive, although we accept that some poeple will not arrive until a bit later. All the timings are available on our wedding website for people who want more detail than when to arrive.

A whole hour early? What on earth for?

We put the actual ceremony time on the invitation part, then in the additional info we put that they would need to be seated in the church 15 minutes before the ceremony.

I would turn up half an hour before the time stated and would be a bit miffed if that then turned into an hour.

We put arrive at 1pm for a 1.30pm ceremony, and evening guests arrive at 5.30pm for a 6pm start.

You don't want people wandering in late or deciding getting a drink is more important than being seated when they should be.

After my interview at 1pm, we'll be opening up the ceremony room doors and starting to usher through people to their seats about 1.15pm - partly also to clear the lounge so that Caz can come down the stairs and through to her interview without being seen by the guests (there is no other way through unfortunately). The bridal party will then assemble in the bar area and at about 1.20pm we'll clear guests into the room so the bridal party can get themselves set up in the corridor outside, awaiting the cue from the registrar at 1.30pm to start the music and open the doors.

We put the time of the ceremony. Most people arrived between 15-30 minutes earlier.

Why do your guests have to be there so early, Tray? Unless you were marrying somewhere that required a security check before admitting guests, I wouldn't turn up more than 30 minutes before.

Agree with everyone else on ceremony time.

RE evening invitations - the norm is probably 7.30 or 8pm. I've got one on Saturday which is 8pm and one on Sunday which is 7.30pm. Even though I'm a very punctual person, I rarely turn up at the time stated on the inviation for an evening do. I normally turn up half an hour later so don't expect everyone to be there in time for your first dance.

Surely that's disrespectful to the bride and groom though? If they've asked guests to be there at, say, 7.30pm for an 8pm start, there are good reasons for that and as a guest you shouldn't second guess them that it's not important for you to be there on time - notwithstanding, of course, unforseen problems like accidents on the motorway.

We have a tightly planned day that, if evening guests turn up late means they will miss out on important parts that we want them to be there for, and as we've gone to all the trouble of providing these things, it might feel that they only came along for the free drink and food which I would hope nobody would be that rude to do.

You put the time of the ceremony on the invitations. It's a wedding and guests will normally turn up a little earlier than the time on the invitations anyway!

Not a bluddy clue - just what we were told by the co-ordinator - which is why we are having welcome drinks and canapes

I tend to arrive half hour after the start of an evening do or any party... Purely because if I've got there on time then I've always been one of the first there!

I was trying to work out when to start our evening do, but am stuck!

Most evening parts to a wedding tend to be 'from 7.30pm' rather than specifying that people have to be there at that time.

I have put the time of ceremony on invites but on a seperate sheet of info asked guest to kindly arrive 20 mins before so that they are not hanging around outside when i arrive as for my reception its at the same venue as wb and have asked for guests to arrive for 7.30 i would expect most to turn up around this time so i can get 1st dance out of the way at 8pm then i can relax ii hope x

We've put the actual ceremony time on our invitation then added a line in the additional information about arriving a bit early.

For the evening we have put 6pm as I want the evening guests to get as much out of the day as possible too. We aren't doing our first dance until 7pm.

If the evening reception is structured like yours is, then I'd agree, but most evening parties are just that - a party. There are no set times for anything. Like Nurse Bride said, I'd hate to be the first there and like Mrs C said, it's usually from a time rather than at the time.

I really do get a bit confused about how different weddings work - I certainly learn something new every day on this forum, every wedding I've ever been to follows the same structure, and certainly locally people just turn up when they like and never ever plan to be at the wedding dance at the time stated. I don't know if ours is going to say 7:30 or 8pm yet but I know for a fact nobody will come until about half 8. Apart from obviously the family and friends who will be there all day - in saying that every local wedding dance I've been to the bride and groom have entered later than stated to do their dance, hence I usually don't miss it! Seriously though I think people up here are worse for it, they're late start late finish people. We'll be partying on til after 1am no doubt and the locals wont even think about get dressed in their wedding gear til at least half 7 lol

Cheers ladies and gent!

I've decided on this text.

RKB and Mr RKB
Request the pleasure of your company at their marriage
On Thursday 15th December
at 2pm
and to dance the night away
from 7pm til late
at 'Insert Venue Name'

R.S.V.P

and the evening invites say

RKB and Mr RKB
Request the pleasure of your company at the evening reception
to celebrate their marriage
On Thursday 15th December 2011
from 7pm til late
at 'Insert Venue Here'

R.S.V.P

The bus to the venue will leave at 6pm from Glasgow and it will take about an hour or so to get to the venue. We plan to have our first dance at 8pm so that we can meet and greet guests as the arrive, and give us a bit of time to mingle with the day guests too.

I think the evenign wording is fine, but just a query about the day wording. You've put that the evening reception is from 7pm - what are they doing in between? Are you having a sit down meal? If I received an invitation with that wording, I'd assume that I was invited to teh ceremony, then had to go away again until 7pm! If you're having a sit down meal following the ceremony, I wouldn't bother with the 7pm bit, I'd just put the venue.

I know, i wasn't really sure about this. I have put an option on the day RSVP's to specify if they can only make part of the day. I don't want them to think that they're excluded from the evening if they can't make the day....or am i just be a bit over the top? (i can't decide). Anyway, that was the reasoning behind why i specified the evening time.

I would just put

and after at ........ for wedding breakfast on day invites and pop an extra line onto rsvp for Evening Only on day rsvp's

with a note explaining if they cant make day but still want to come to eve they are welcome as long as they tick the box

HTH x

On the invite we have put 2:45. Then on guest information we have put "Please be seated by 2:45pm for the brides enterance at 3pm. Out of respect to the bridal party the church doors will close at 3pm and reopen once the service has finished"

That may seem a bit odd but my family has a really bad annoying habit of turning up late. I hate it and find it so disrespectful. The last thing I want is people walking into the church once the service has started. Our priest is a stickler for time keeping