A bride has sparked a debate after charging her guest a no-show fee for failing to attend her wedding.
Now, as we all know, weddings are utterly stressful and not only that, they're also very expensive.
One Australian bride decided that she was going to make a guest, who failed to show up at her wedding, pay a no-show fee after they canceled on her with only a few days left until the special occasion.
Speaking on the podcast She's on The Money, she said: "It’s now one week out from the wedding and I have already given the confirmed numbers to the venue and paid the outstanding amount, which was $18,600. Within the last week ten guests, who had previously RSVP’d that they were coming have now canceled citing that it's too expensive for them to travel interstate."
The bride then stated that she was "scrambling to cover costs" which racked up to a whopping $2,000 for these no-show guests.
"Is it reasonable to request that they cover these costs themselves?" she asked.
The woman also detailed that she gave guests a one and a half year notice and asked them to RSVP by the end of summer - which most of the guests did.
But now, with only a few days left until the wedding, they're slowly pulling out.
"So sorry, I know we RSVP’d yes and the wedding is next week but we just can’t afford to travel interstate at the moment," one guest wrote in a text message to the bride. "Hope you understand, would love to have been there."
Taking to the comment section under the text message, social media users expressed their opinions on the matter, with many stating that this person was "not a nice friend."
"No one books flights for an interstate wedding the week prior," wrote one user. "The guest is 100% at fault here and is not a nice friend for doing this. It’d be different if she/partner/family fell ill and couldn’t make it. But no one plans their travel a week prior and suddenly finds out they can’t afford it..."
"As someone who has invited my guests to my interstate wedding over a year in advance, I would be pretty annoyed if a guest cancelled at the last minute (regardless of how they are getting there, plane, flight etc.)," added another.
They then stated that they would understand if something else came up but "if it's a matter of money, surely with that much notice the guest could budget for the event ahead of time," they said, before explaining: "If it was an event outside of the guest's control that they couldn't foresee (like illness, job loss, death or another event) I would completely understand. For me it depends on why are they cancelling and are they offering to pay it or not. If they offered, I would say no thank you, but I'd appreciate the thought behind it! If they're assuming I will cover it and late cancel without explanation, I would be annoyed."
However, not everyone agreed with that stance.
"If you can’t afford to cover the cost then have a cheaper wedding. This is the bride and groom’s event so it’s up to them to cover the cost and NOT the people they chose to invite," this user wrote while another also had a similar thought, writing: "No, personally I think that’s rude and gauche. I had a couple of guests cancel the week of our wedding because they caught covid. No way would I even think to ask them to pay. I would have said no if they offered to. It’s the quickest way to cause awkwardness & potentially ruin the friendship/relationship with that person."
A final person stated: "We had a few pull out last minute due to work and other changes which is totally understable but does impact us financially as no changes can be made within the final 4 weeks, and someone else could have been invited, which can feel a bit icky to do last minute."
What do you think?