Uninvited guests - please help..

[DGG]

So, I haven't even sent out my invites yet - but we've spoken to our close friends and family and they're booking the trip now..

but I have a question --

Did you guys invite everyone with guest or only people with significant others?

We're sort of torn about what to do - I know people are making a long trip to our wedding so I guess they should be able to bring a guest, but our resort is not all-inclusive and we are going to be paying $200-300 per guest for the weekend (reception, welcome party, farewell bruch) and we are intentionally having a smaller destination wedding...

I don't know if I'm being selfish, but I don't want to pay for random people or have random people at my wedding.. but one of my single friends already told me she's bringing her sister and I didn't know what to say...

Am I being ridiculous Maybe I'm just annoyed she didn't even ask if it was okay

[KLC77]

Oh, I am right there with you on this one. We did not invite people with guests and our resort IS all inclusive. We knew we wanted an intimate wedding with only people we consider family and I didn't want to look at my pictures in 10 years and not know who some of the people were because they happened to be one of our friend's flavor of the month (although some of them have had gf's or bf's for over a year and we didn't include them if they weren't our close friend). I don't care if it was a bitchy thing to do. lol On this one issue my thought was~ I'm the Bride! lol So, to prevent uninvited guests I pre-filled in our reply cards with the peoples names. That way there was no confusion as to who was invited. Also, we are not having children at our wedding and pre-filling the reply cards let our guests know exactly who was invited.

 

This worked pretty well with us because the people we invited by themselves are all friends with each other so its not like they don't know anyone else or won't have anyone to room with etc. We're a close group so it worked.

[DGG]

Thanks, now I feel a little better Now I have to think about what to do with this one friend...

[KLC77]

Hmmm, maybe you can let her know that of course she can bring her sister on the trip, but unfortunately she won't be able to attend your wedding due to the added costs or that you're having a really small wedding. I think that some people just get excited about taking a trip and forget that its your WEDDING. I also think that people don't realize that there are costs to having a wedding at a resort just like if you had it at home.

 

It may work out in the end because a lot of people say they are coming and then don't, so maybe you will have room for the sister. Or maybe she won't be able to come at all, but right now thinks she can. Things always change with guests right up until the day they leave!

[~Debra~]

I am having this exact problem right now. My FI has invited like 45 people (when our total guest list is supposed to be 40) and every other day one of the people he invited is RSVPing on our website for them and another person. I find myself asking him pretty often who these people are. They may be girlfriends or boyfriends but I have not met ANY of these people. I wanted to do the group photo because I think its cute but I don't want a photo with a bunch of people I don't know. Consider yourself lucky that only one person wants to bring a guest. Oh and we are staying at an AI but we are getting married offsite so we have to pay for every person who attends the ceremony and reception. I, like you, thought it was rude for people to just assume they can bring a guest but what can you do when technically its their vaca too. Let me know what you decide to do so I can do it too! lol

[DGG]

I think for her I will just have to deal - I have known her for years and I do know her sister pretty well.. I was just so upset because she told me by leaving me a voicemail saying guess what my sister's coming with me to your wedding..

And we don't even have our save the dates printed yet..

For her, if she asked I would probably have said yes...

But now I decided when we print our invites, we're not adding +guest for anyone.. If we don't even know a significant other's name, they're not invited..

Although sometimes I wish we stuck with our original thought to elope alone

I guess I'm certainly not the only one dealing with this

[shellb]

To allow or not allow an unknown guest is a tough one. In my experience, some people will:

• Be very offended if they can't bring their significant other or travelling buddy. I know I would. The wedding is one day out of generally a week and they may not know other guests or be comfortable sharing a room with an acquaintance.
• Not realize there are extra costs since it is an AI. I've had to explain to a few people that our wedding is not free and we are paying above and beyond the wedding package we purchased for each extra person if we have more than 24.
• Choose not to come because they can not pony up the price of a single supplement room which they may have to do if they have no one to share a room with. I know for us a single supplement room was $460 more for the week. Try not to be too disappointed if this is the case.

For most DW, 3/4 of the people that say there are coming won't be there even when they RSVP and book, especially with this economy. We did allow for people to bring guests, but made sure people knew we had to know far in advance because of the extra costs associated for us and that if we really didn't know them well we'd prefer if they didn't attend the wedding activities parts of the week we have planned.

[Jen_S]

When we sent out our invites we included guests however our resort is a AI. The reason we decided on guests is that a lot of our guests have not met and since it is not just a 1 day event we thought it would more comfortable for them to have a guest plus it is cheaper for double occupency for the rooms. I know I would not want to share a room with someone I did not know.

[Rob&Sue]

We also included guests when we sent out our invites. However, like jkcz0702, our resort is an AI, and everyone is paying for their own vacation there. While there are additional costs for us for each guest, they aren't anything near to $200-300 per guest. That's a lot of money!! Our costs are probably $20-30 per guest when we add everything up.

One of my old friends from university is coming with a close friend of hers who I know of, but don't really know and have never really hung out with.... I'm wondering now if that will be strange, and/or if everyone will integrate well. When it comes down to it, I'm just really happy this friend is coming to the wedding, and if it means there's going to be this person I barely know there as well, I'll deal with that!

I think a lot of people don't realize that there are costs to you with DWs, per guest. Your friend probably didn't realize the expense, and was just getting excited about the trip and your wedding.

[Maybride2009]

That's a tough one. Luckily most of the people we invited are married, but we did invite my FI's brothers' girlfriends and my best friend is single so I told her she could bring a friend. She doesn't know anyone there and i didn't want her to be forced to pay the single room price when she could spilt it with someone, because I know I would hate it if I had to travel to mexico without a buddy. Sometimes I forget that it is their vacation too.

I found that most of the people that said they were coming didn't anyways so even with inviting extra people we still have a small group