Late invitation etiquette

I would try calling or emailing the people you invited who haven't responded yet to see if they received their invitations before I sent any more invitations out.

First you need really need to get organized. Check and re-check to be sure you have the correct address for your guests. Don't lie and blame the post office.

You should send out the invitations to your guests along with a small handwritten note apologizing for the delay - and let them know you hope they can be in attendace on your special day.

I have checked the addresses and rechecked... none of the invitations have been returned, I just don't know where they are.

I am working on getting responses for the RSVP's not received yet but even if all of those people attend, I will still be short.

I like that idea of the handwritten note, that would be really thoughtful on my part.

For the missing invites your best bet will be to pick up the phone and give the guests a call to see who has / has not received them yet.

Did you drop your invitations off at a Post Office or just a mailbox?

I'm one of the people that didn't get an invite once, it can happen. Ironically since its rude to ask if you are invited to a wedding I just waited until the bride literally walked up to me one day and asked if I was going to RSVP soon and I had to tell her I hadn't gotten an invite... so take pity and give them a call sooner than later =). Last minute invites not caused by postal mishaps are tough and I'd get them out very soon, but be prepared that with only 3.5 weeks many people may still decline because of short notice.

Also, minimum numbers and paying per head for open bar are two things that terrified me in the wedding venue search.

Are you in the DC area? All of the invites we sent out of our normal post office in VA were FINE but my FH dropped 3 off at a a post office in DC and one took over a week to get to FL and one didn't show at all. (To the president of my company! Awesome...) A friend also sent her STDs out of DC and apparently multiple ones were lost. We were supposed to get one... it never arrived. So the post office CAN lose a few. I'd certainly call people you haven't heard from yet and just check to make sure that they received the invite. For any late invites... if you have less than 2 weeks by the time they received it for them to RSVP, you really should figure out if A) you're willing to just pay for empty spots or B) bite the bullet and just apologize for the late invite. You can fib with a few people saying that the invite was lost, but if you give the story to too many and they start talking... I don't know. It could be messy.

What craziness! You should just call them and ask if they have received their RSVPs because you have had other invitees inform you they have not. Go ahead and fib - the person you call can choose to believe you or not, whether it's true or not.

To the others - We are actually trying to just do a F&B minimum flat rate - that way we won't have to worry about people not showing up. Hotels are mostly worried about their profit margin being above a certain level for the space they are renting out - they may have a maximum number of people allowed there -- if you are guaranteed to have more than 150 people, you should always try to get a flat rate.