LOVELY WEDDING RECEPTION ROOM BUT BEWARE!

We had our wedding reception here a few days ago (June 2024).

We originally enquired about the venue on the 17/7 getting £1800 self catered quote.

Upon viewing, we were told it would be £3300 but she would try to give us a discount. The final price was £3050 which is very different to what we were quoted a few months before! We also found out that It would not include anything listed in the original quote either and we had to pay extra for example circa £1.50 for knives and forks per person, napkins £1 per person, minimum bar spend of £2000.

We unfortunately had to reschedule the wedding from April 12th due to a close family bereavement. We informed the venue via email on 21/2 that we would need to move it. My partner received an out of office from Shivani. She got a reply on the 8/3 stating we could move it but we had to book a new date by 15/3 otherwise we’d lose our £2000 deposit. Could you organise a wedding date in one week, discussing with Nigerian family, the church, caterers, wedding cake maker, decorators, hair and make up and family in one week?! What kind of compassion is this? This added extra stress and pressure to make sure everyone could make it. Still we managed to do this.

We have emailed a couple of times and asked for the discount code for the rooms with no reply. My fiancé had to message the holiday inn account on instagram (Shivani told my fiancé she controls the account) to get the room discount codes! We now have them - weeks before the wedding!

Family members had already booked their room. I asked about giving the discount on already booked rooms however of course, an obstacle, “we cannot do this, they’ll have to cancel the room and rebook it”. Good quality customer care and added stress.

We changed our mind regarding having ‘soft drink corkage’ to having the bar open. Another obstacle - “we cannot refund you the money, it’ll have to go onto the bar tab”. Even with a £2000 minimum spend, this £250 doesn’t get taken off of that money so the £2000 minimum bar spend stands. “No, sadly not as the £250.00 is already contracted and for us in a self-catering package, corkage is allocated as a room hire cost.

On this occasion the best option I can offer you would be £250.00 bar tab and then the function bar at a minimum spend of £2,000.00.

Please do let me know how you’d like to proceed.”

On the 17th May, I submitted a formal complaint about everything listed above.

When we arrived to check into our ‘honey moon suite’ we found dirty plates and cups on the floor outside the door.

The £2000 minimal bar spend; the small bar in the reception room barely stocked any alcohol ‘shorts’ so many of our guests were going to the other bar in the Bella Italia section. I am highly dubious that this was counted into the wedding bar spend because they weren’t being asked who was wedding party and who wasn’t. This leads me onto the fact that at 23:56 I was debited £400 which declined as I don’t keep money in that account. At 23:57, they tried again to debit £400 which declined then 16 mins later I was debited £450 which also declined. Where did that extra £50 suddenly come from? I discussed this at checkout and had to pay £400. The receptionist assured me that the drinks from the other bar were taken off the minimum bar spend but as previously mentioned I am dubious.

There was a bin bag left in the reception room with some foil in it. They emailed the catering to say that they had broken the agreed contract and they were going to take £500 from their account.

As mentioned, I have previously complained in May with no response from any ‘hotel manager’ (they keep telling me he’s called Paz but I’m unsure if he is real!) I have called but reception tell me he’s not in. I found Shivani extremely unhelpful.

We both said we wish we’d just picked another venue because believe me the battle and stress that this place gives you isn’t worth it.

Well I can’t put into words how amazing the staff was for my wedding. They all made sure it went smoothly
Food was brilliant
Everywhere was so clean
Made my day perfect
Thank you too all the staff for all the hard work and effort
Highly recommend the place
Communication from day one with Linda was brilliant
David top bloke brilliant on the day and made it all run smoothly

We got married at this Hotel on 23rd June. After booking this venue 18 months prior to the wedding we was informed around 6 months before the wedding that the Hotel had been sold and would be refurbished and become a Holiday Inn. 6 weeks before the wedding day we was then informed that there would be no bedrooms available but the wedding would go ahead. We were very concerned that our Wedding wouldn’t go ahead but was assured by the Manager that it would. We turned up on the morning of the wedding to be utterly stunned at the transformation and quality of the Hotel. The day couldn’t have gone better and we really want to thank David the Hotel Manager and his wife and staff for jumping through hoops and going the extra mile to ensure our day was in fact very very special. David the Hotel Manager acted as our Toastmaster and was brilliant. I would also like to personally thank Linda for arranging the whole wedding for us under difficult circumstances. Our guests were very pleased with the quality and presentation of the food and the room layout. The DJ was fantastic. All in all it was the best day of our life.
Thank you Mr and Mrs Keen

Hi Linda,

I just wanted to say thank you for being such a great help with organising the bits and bobs that we needed for our wedding.
The renovations were the talk of the night and I’m sure some people are going to want to use your facilities after being a part of our wedding.
Thank you Linda for being easy to work with and for being prompt in responding to our questions and queries.
All the best in your future!

Regards

Praise