Freaking Out About Officiant, please help!

Your planner is a professional. I would try to bring it up in a non-confrontational way and say, "hey, everything has been fantastic. However, I've been a little stressed out about the ceremony process. The officiant has overall been great to work with, but recently we've had some communication issues."

Agree with Hannah. Your wedding planner should still be told, regardless of her relationship with him. I'm not telling you to badmouth him, but definitely say you are stressed by the miscommunication, at the least.

View Quoted Comment

Thank you for your reply - I'll definitely mention it to her. It just seems so strange that he would somehow rewrite what I fixed when he praised my changes during a zoom meeting.

View Quoted Comment

Thanks for replying - I'll definitely do what you and Hanna advised. As I said, I don't know what to make of him changing stuff on me when he told me in a zoom meeting that he liked what I'd done. Especially when this was supposed to be the crisp, finalized version too.

That’s so unacceptable of your planner to do. Regardless of how sweet she was to you that’s her job! By not working with a professional officiant she is cheating you out of money so the cake doesn’t really make a difference at this point. And it’s not like you asked for free cake. You asked for an officiant that knew what he was doing.
She didn’t provide that but lied to you and said she is providing that. I would be VERY upfront with her and find a new officiant. This is your wedding day and she is your wedding planner. She’s not a friend. Just because she was nice to you doesn’t mean that you should feel nervous to call her out on nonsense. You’re paying for this!

Could you perhaps request a conference call/Zoom call with the planner and the officiant (and of course your FS too) to finalize the ceremony wording together? Like I'm thinking you could ask him to share his screen, suggest the edits, and watch as he types them into the document (or if he has a different suggestion, in which case everyone talks it out)? And then everyone can decide on concrete next steps and deadlines for those next steps. By having the planner there too, hopefully you'll avoid the communication difficulties. In order to soften the messaging a bit when you suggest the meeting, you could always say something like "Hi [planner] and [officiant]! As we are 2.5 weeks out, [FS] and I would really, really like to finalize the ceremony wording and our vows. [FS] and I find that video calls are easier than emails back and forth to make sure we're all on the same page. Can we all jump on a quick Zoom call tomorrow evening or Friday to make the final edits to the ceremony document together? That would go a long, long way in getting [FS] and I ready for our big day, and we are so excited to continue working with you! Thank you in advance for making a little bit of time in your busy schedules to finalize this important part of our wedding! I will send a Zoom invite. Would tomorrow or Friday be more convenient for you guys?" I think you have to force the issue here because it's cool that this is his side hustle and all, but he NEEDS to meet client needs, especially 2.5 weeks out. Best of luck!!!

I would take the emotion out of it and just have an honest conversation. As far as she knows, she doesn’t know that you know they are together right? IMO I don’t think she should have had her BF be the officiant. Your paying for a service and you are not getting what you want/wanted so you just need to address it as if you knew nothin of the relationship.

View Quoted Comment The unfortunate thing is, I’ve had two zoom video calls with him while setting up the ceremony. So I’ve watched him writing and typing notes as we went over my exact edits that have now disappeared. That’s what is so strange. He spoke to me about what I wrote basically face to face, so on video, and now they’re no longer there in the final draft. So I don’t know what to think of the sudden big mistake. I have my final planning meeting with my wedding planner on Monday and I will talk to her about this. Thank you for replying!

View Quoted Comment Yea, I’m gonna have to say something. If only a little section had been left out, I would think it was an honest mistake and he was just busy or rushed. But the way we went over everything already, we spoke first hand about what I had edited, and then in the final draft, it’s suddenly changed so much, it’s thrown me for such a loop when it should have been super easy. Everything up to this point has been so simple and right on track. I guess everyone had some sort of problem during planning, just wish it wasn’t at 2 1/2 weeks out lol

View Quoted Comment Yea, my whole viewpoint has shifted a bit with this happening. I’ll be anxious to see what kind of reply I get from him and what my planner tells me as well. It’s left such a sour taste in my mouth when I was so thankful and also getting my tip calculations sorted out too. Thank you for your reply!

View Quoted Comment Did you let him know the issue? I'm wondering if maybe he just sent you the wrong document. I've definitely attached the wrong draft of a paper before when sending it out! Lol.

View Quoted Comment Lol I thought that at first too! And really hoped that was the case. I’ve done the same thing so no harm no foul if he had done that. But I know for sure he didn’t because there was one main edit in the final about my parents giving me away that was correct. And we talked about it at the previous meeting I had with him. But the other parts of the ceremony were put down almost opposite of what I discussed with him. So half was what I had edited or wanted, the other half was backwards or completely different. Really weird. I did email back right away and explain, very respectfully, that some things weren’t quite right. I even made a new document with exactly what he needs from start to finish, and marked the parts he had wrong. 🤷🏼‍♀️

Have the conversation. She is a professional. My husband and I used to work together as videographers, and I would absolutely have expected a couple to be willing to tell him (as he was the head of the company) if they felt my behavior was unprofessional.

Also, moving forward, don't edit an officiant's ceremony. Most officiants won't even allow you to do this. This is their job, even if they only do it on the side. You hire people for their expertise. An officiant isn't just someone who recites words you provide off a piece of paper - if you want that, have a friend get ordained and hand them a script. If you don't like the ceremony an officiant provides, you should find someone whose ceremony you do like, not try to "fix" theirs. You can provide input on specific readings and things you may want, but you should never go editing it.

View Quoted Comment

Agree with this.

Unfortunately there always seems to be an issue with packages like this. There's always a reason they are an unbelievable price or why you are getting something for nothing. I'd definitely bring it up to her. See how she handles it. If she can't hold her professionalism and take care of the situation then I'd drop them both.

View Quoted Comment Absolutely agree

View Quoted Comment I wouldn’t have edited anything if he didn’t give me the okay. He not only told me to change things up and move things around as I’d like, he encouraged it. He gave me options on purpose for what I wanted as well, so I could literally pick and choose what I wanted and what I didn’t want. This is a direct quote from one of the emails: “feel free to mix and match by section, edit, remove items, replace verbiage, or add elements that you are inspired by.” So the issue isn’t stemming from me overstepping my bounds or asking him to do more than he was supposed to or agreed upon.

Sit down with fiancé and both vendors to get on the same page and let them know of the glaring error. If they refuse to resolve it, look into getting married at the courthouse.

View Quoted Comment I never heard of not getting to make changes to the officiants ceremony. We have an ordained minister marring us and he gave us a copy of the ceremony and told us not to be afraid to make any changes to it because it's our wedding not his.

View Quoted Comment Same, I actually thought it was part of being an officiant, no matter what type of officiant. I’ve heard of multiple edits or completely custom ceremonies and vows costing extra, but you’d have to go through a ton of vendors to get a ceremony that’s just right if you couldn’t edit things. Plus, it’s like saying he can make up words about you and your fiancé, but you can’t do the same. Like, what?