I want to preface this by saying I understand how privileged I am to even have had this experience. This particular situation on my wedding day was much smaller in comparison to the issues of the world today.
But anyways, I want to share in the event that anyone has had a similar experience. So to edit my title, 1/2 of my beauty company cancelled. The owner and lead stylist came down with strep the day before my wedding. I can sympathize and understand that she is human and these things happen. I appreciate that she did not want to spread her illness to me and my bridal party. I am raising my eyebrow a bit though because looking back at my contract, it does promise 3 stylists, so that is a little shady to me that the plan turned into two without any explicit mention to me.
I had 12 ladies total anticipating having their hair and make up done for my wedding last month and had to reconfigure this plan the night of my wedding. It added just a little stress (sarcasm) to an already stressful night. Everything worked out fine and it was still a beautiful night despite this hiccup.
My concerns really come with how everything was handled after the wedding. Here they are:
The 1 stylist who came lost track of the number of services she carried out. I naturally was not able to think clearly on the day of the wedding and when she was about to leave, we agreed that it was either 13 or 14 services. It's a bit fuzzy because I was so anxious at this point but I think where we left it, I said I would determine this at a better time, and confirm with the owner who would handle the refund. A couple of weeks later, the owner said her stylist said it was 16 services. I can definitely say this number was NEVER mentioned on the day of the wedding and the stylist admitted to losing track. This is what the owner wrote to me verbatim: "I paid her for 16, but it's fine. I'll just send another $200. It's not worth going back and forth over..." I just felt attitude in her text and got the impression that she thought I was trying to scam her or something. Also, why is it my concern that she already paid her stylist?
There were a couple of other things as well but I guess after having been partially cancelled on for a $2,400 service, there was no efforts to mend the situation. Like one obvious one might be to comp one of my services? Instead, the process of being refunded has been another hurdle in itself.
I will add one more thing- I tried to reduce the number of services three days past the deadline and her response was that her stylist had already been paid so the best she could do was give me a gift card. My wedding was 2 hours away from where I live so that was not useful to me at all. I guess I felt like she held me to this ridiculously high standard and showed me no grace. It felt like a bit of a double standard.
I plan to write her a respectful but direct email once I finally receive my refund. There have been issues with the payment company she uses that I have had to do all the follow up on.
I clearly am still really frustrated by this situation and before I process this in therapy, thought I might share it with a community that might be able to relate. Am I valid in being frustrated and feeling like I received horrible customer service in this situation?
Thanks for reading all the way through!
Maureen
