Wedding day of coordinator cancelled the day before our wedding

I am NOT OOP, OOP is u/treefrog1090

Originally posted to r/legaladvice

Wedding day of coordinator cancelled the day before our wedding

Thanks to u/soayherder for suggesting this BoRU

Mood Spoilers: >!appalling!<

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Original Post: September 15, 2025

Location: Pennsylvania

We got married in the afternoon of Saturday 9/13. In the early morning of Friday 9/12 our day of coordinator sent an email that she was cancelling her event management service due to an "unforeseen personal matter". Most of what was listed as services in the original contract didn't happen because they were in person services for the day of the wedding (providing bathroom baskets, setting up before the ceremony, helping line up and cue the processional, coordinate timing of speeches, cake cutting etc), though she had helped us with the timeline so we did get some service. It was a very stressful 24 hours but thankfully all of our other vendors went above and beyond to still make things run smoothly.

In the original contract it states that in the event of illness or other unforeseen circumstances where the primary contact is unavailable they will make every reasonable effort to find a replacement. Considering that a few days before she said on the phone her assistant would be available should anything happen (she had flaked on another scheduled commitments so I asked) it was quite a surprise when we got the full cancellation email.

She also attached a letter saying that she would refund 50% and at the bottom put a "non disparagement agreement" that stated: as part of this cancellation and refund arrangement, both parties agree to refrain from making any negative or disparaging remarks, written or verbal, about one another in any capacity, including online platforms, social media, or other public forums.

My question is two fold:

1. We are going to try and get all our money back (or at least 75%), and threaten her with either a venmo dispute (we paid as goods and services less than 180 days ago) or small claims court. I think with all the email and text evidence we have we'd have a good case for breach of contract but the total amount of the service was around $950, not sure if it's worth it?

2. If we wait until getting the money back, are we not allowed to write a negative review based on her "non disparagement agreement"? I didn't sign anything to that effect. We definitely want to warn other couples planning their wedding about her.

Edited to add: In the cancellation letter there was nothing for me to sign, just a statement. I would not have signed it but there wasn't even an option to.

Relevant / Top Comments

Commenter 1:

1. Honestly, for $237 (I think that's the difference between 50% and 75%) it's not worth the expense and the time taken off of work to sue her.

2. If you post a bad review then she probably takes the 50% offer off the table. And you don't know what happened. Maybe she's a flake. Maybe she got into a bad car accident that night or her mother had a heart attack and died and her assistant was at another wedding. Maybe it was one of those life catastrophes, maybe she's a doofus. I'd want to know more, before posting a bad review.

I'd ask for 75% and if she agrees, take it. If she doesn't agree, I'd probably take the 50%.

OOP: Thanks for the response! Good point about the price difference, it was more on principle (if I had cancelled on her within 30 days she would keep 75% per the contract).

Regarding the second point, what makes me really want to write the review is shortly after we had signed, she reached out about a venmo dispute that turned out to be with a different bride who had the same first name as me. She told me that the other bride had called off the wedding but was wanting a refund, which seemed logical at the time but suspicious in retrospect.

Commenter 2: Obviously, I don’t know this person at all, but I think we should all keep in mind that when someone says they had a personal emergency and they had to cancel a work commitment there is a very good chance that it is a genuine emergency such as a death in the family or a major health problem. I would not jump straight to threats.

The reality is that you’re not going to get lawyers involved here. It’s just not worth it.

OOP: Yes you're correct, except that she had told me 3 days before cancelling was a contingency plan (she had confirmed that the assistant planner did not have another wedding the same day and would be available if necessary). The reality is that if our other vendors (the venue in particular) hadn't been so amazing our wedding would have been a total mess since we hired her specifically to coordinate set up of the venue and vendor item drop off the day of. I would of course not say anything personally disparaging in the review besides the facts, but I do think it is important for others to know when considering her company that they did not follow through on their stated backup plan should an unforeseen circumstance occur.

Commenter 3: So what happened to the assistant planner?! Did she never explain why she wasn’t available?

OOP: Nope! No explanation! We got the email that she was cancelling the event management services at 1am friday morning, but we had the start of wedding activities friday so I decided we would just put it from our minds until monday so as not to lay a damper on our celebrations. Thus far have not responded to the cancellation email, we're considering our options before responding (hence picking the collective minds of this subreddit!)

Commenter 4: Wedding planner here this happened to me once (I delivered a baby 5 weeks early) I had a little more time, 2 weeks, to hand off the wedding but I paid the fee they paid me and an extra $700 because that’s what it cost to find someone reputable to take care of them.

Go for 100% refund for non disparaging agreement. If she gave you her run of show to operate from I could reasonably see 75-80% refund, but if she didn’t hand over any assets I’d go after the full amount. Even if she invested time to understand how to execute her services (eg site tour) she didn’t deliver the services.

I’m so sorry that happened but it sounds like your vendor team were amazing!!

OOP: Thanks this is helpful context! I would be more understanding (life happens!) if she hadn’t assured me that there was a backup assistant that was available who never materialized. I didn’t mention in my original post because I noticed it wasn’t in the original contract, but she did schedule a venue tour with my husband, myself, and the venue operator the week before which she confirmed and then also cancelled 10 hours later!! Thanks for affirming my thoughts that this is……..not a normal behavior for a planner/DOC running a business

Commenter 5: I would need more than a 50% refund to sign a non-disparagement agreement.

 

Update: September 28, 2025 (nearly two weeks later)

[Update] Wedding day of coordinator cancelled the day before our wedding

original post here: https://www.reddit.com/r/legaladvice/comments/1nhr3o6/wedding_day_of_coordinator_cancelled_the_day/

Location: Pennsylvania

Hi everyone, just wanted to provide an update on my previous post now that everything is resolved. Thank you so much to everyone who took the time to comment. We read through every one and it really helped us decide what to do. Now, on to the update:

1. We decided to email a (long) list of the ways we believed they breached our contract, including not making every (any?) effort to find a replacement if an unexpected circumstance arose, and asked for a full refund within 7 days.

2. They responded saying they would only be able to provide 50% refund after we signed the non-disparagement agreement (good job to those of you who thought they would eventually ask for us to sign it)

3. We responded saying we would sign the non-disparagement agreement if we were provided a 75% refund. As one commentator suggested, our plan was to then write a non-review review ("we cannot say more publicly but please DM if you are thinking of working with this company") in our local wedding facebook groups.

4. They responded saying that due to still needing to pay their staff despite the cancellation they could only provide a 50% refund but that we were welcome to do a venmo dispute for the full amount and they would honor it.

5. We did file a venmo dispute (we had paid using goods and services) and included all of the correspondence, original contract, etc. The day of coordinator must have promptly non-contested with venmo because they ruled in our favor the next day! They did reach out and asked us to confirm that we received the money, we responded saying we did, and have not had any further contact.

Since we did not sign any non-disparagement agreement, we are planning to post a review. A few of you suggested that they might have double booked but we didn't see anything on their socials as of today. I guess we'll never know if they did have a family emergency and didn't have their supposedly confirmed backup available or if it was some kind of a scam. But at least we got our full money back and don't need to worry about them suing us for defamation since we never signed anything!

 

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