When should i pay off my vendors?

I waited until the absolute deadline to do final payments. Lol.


I’m not sure if you want to pay your vendors off so soon considering how up in the air everything is with weddings and shelter-in-places laws. Less money tied up means less hassle trying to get refunds back if things get canceled.
I invited 290 people and I believe around 165 people came. We had a semi-destination wedding with 90% of our guests traveling (1/2 at least 2 hours each way by car. And the other 1/2 by plane.). We didn’t have anyone that was a no-show or last-minute cancel on us.

I would keep the final payments in a savings account and then pay them on their due dates. I at least wouldn’t pay anything off more than a month out or before you have your final head count from rsvps. You never know what could happen and you don’t want to throw away that money. We have family and friends all over the country so it was tough and we knew not everyone would come or bring a plus one, but we invited 82 and had 44 say yes.

View Quoted Comment Yes that was something else I was taking into consideration, but I did read through my contract and all amounts are refundable if the venue cancels the event. Which would be the only reason I would postpone. We have 87 people invited mostly just close friends and family.

View Quoted Comment Oh well then if you’re sure you can get the money back easily, definitely pay it off as soon as you can.


We originally planned to do monthly installments so we weren’t hit with everything at once, but we lagged. We did our initial deposits and didn’t do the rest. It was not fun seeing over $50k leave our bank account all within a month so don’t do what we did. 😂

View Quoted Comment Thats my deal, I don't want that money to sit in my account and me not budget properly, I just want to be paid in full asap so I am not scrambling to pay off my commitments.

I would hold off for awhile. Many brides are still having to fight for their refundable portion of their bill. Put the money aside and avoid a legal fight down the road. These shutdowns could continue or even come back.

I would definitely hold off. If a vendor goes bankrupt, you're not getting that money back.


I think the bigger issue is you need to budget properly in all aspects of life

View Quoted Comment Ah, got it. Yeah, we had the money saved already and were pretty good about not spending it. However, you do get sticker shock when you see it leave your bank account all at once so I would normally suggest splitting it up so you don’t even notice.


I agree though... lots of businesses are going out of business or filing for bankruptcy. The last thing you want to do is pay in full and later find out your vendor is out of business. I suggest putting the money in a savings and whatever you do— just don’t touch it unless you need it to pay for food or bills during an emergency.

Typically most vendors want final payment within 30-60 days prior to event date. With the current times I would suggest keeping money in a savings account or maybe labeling envelopes and "paying" the balance by leaving money in them for each appropriate vendor. A lot of contracts have it that if you've paid in full and for any reason needed to cancel or what have you - they keep all the money.

Like others, I would hold off. I know you don't think you'll have many declines, but depending on how local your guest list is, you may have more than you think. 99% (yes I did the math) of our guest list was from out of state (10+ hours away), and a number of them were older and thus unable to travel. Plus, there was a 50th anniversary cruise that took a family of 20 to Alaska the same weekend we got married. All of that to say, I wouldn't do all of my rentals until I knew for sure my numbers.

I waited as well. For the food count is was 30 days before the date. And other vendors like flowers and coordinator was 2 weeks before. So for us everything I mean everything was paid for before we had to postpone.
So wait a bit of you can since numbers might change.

I wouldn't pay anything until it's actually due, especially with Covid-19. In the event you have to change anything, I would hate to possibly be "out" more money that deposits because you paid ahead.

I too like to get my bills out of the way, but am really glad I waited. We've paid about $5k in deposits and reservation fees so far and might have to cancel our wedding entirely. If I had paid ahead I'd be worried I couldn't recoup the extra money. One of my friends said that a number of caterers in her area have gone out of business completely because they couldn't cope with the economic fallout, so any couple who booked those businesses are completely out of luck.

Wait until your bills are due!

View Quoted Comment Do you have an all inclusive venue? If not then I would only pay off who I was sure would refund my money to me if the wedding could not take place. But I also agree with the other ladies on waiting to the last possible moment you can to pay which I think is about two weeks prior. I read a lot of horror stories of venues who wouldn’t cancel the wedding due to COVID and if the couple wanted to cancel it was their call which then backs them into a corner of not receiving a refund since the venue didn’t do the canceling. So just Incase there is a second wave or gatherings are still limited I would hold off making final deposits until whenever your vendors say they are due.

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Yes, this. No one could have predicted the current situation, and sure, it used to be a smart budgeting strategy to pay stuff off quickly. But, I think everyone should learn from the struggles that people are going through NOW and simply set the money aside until you absolutely have to pay it. Far better to lose a deposit than the whole amount if the worst happens.