The stupidity of a wedding venue

[pete.young]

If this venue is run by Harrow Council, I can absolutely see why they are trying to think of every way possible to raise some more revenue, caught as they are between the rock of increasing costs for everything and the hard place of central government reductions in budgets and demands for savings.

 

Would probably have been simpler to just put their charges up by 10% but hey.

[EBS_freak]

44 minutes ago, pete.young said:

Would probably have been simpler to just put their charges up by 10% but hey.

Can't be seen to be the villans. Unlucky for them that their underhand tactic would seem to be biting them in the donkey.

[zbd1960]

As someone noted earlier, it's the kind of nonsense that gets dreamt up by MBA types - all theory and no real world experience

[nilorius]

$hit happens.

Edited July 13, 2022 by nilorius

[EBS_freak]

2 hours ago, zbd1960 said:

As someone noted earlier, it's the kind of nonsense that gets dreamt up by MBA types - all theory and no real world experience

Defo

[EBS_freak]

Interesting to see that Google is hiding reviews… to go along side the venue removing the Facebook ones.

 

Censorship and all that.

[Woodinblack]

6 minutes ago, EBS_freak said:

Interesting to see that Google is hiding reviews… to go along side the venue removing the Facebook ones.

 

Are they? They seem pretty damning when i look at them. Their current rating is 2 stars, are you looking at the right Great Barn, there are a lot of them!

[Doctor J]

They've hidden most of the ones from earlier. The only negative reviews you see now are ones left in the last few hours.

[EBS_freak]

21 minutes ago, Woodinblack said:

 

Are they? They seem pretty damning when i look at them. Their current rating is 2 stars, are you looking at the right Great Barn, there are a lot of them!

Yes. There was about a hundred…

 

edit - 150ish

Edited July 13, 2022 by EBS_freak

[Woodinblack]

Well, it actually makes sense that they remove them as although you could call it censorship, they are not actually reviews of the venue, they are people complaining about this post. 

[Jonesy]

The volume of reviews could be the issue here rather than Google purposely hiding them. Their algorithms will remove anything they think is spam, so a business getting 150 odd reviews in the last few hours is getting logged as suspicious and probably banked for review to make sure they're legit. They might come back.

 

I thought some of the reviews were harsh though tbf. It's a crappy thing that they've done, but some of the reviews were written by people saying they were just going to go for a look at the venue and they've cancelled because they found out about the charge. They hadn't actually used the barn, but reviewed it anyway.

 

It'd be a bit like giving a bass a bad review because of an issue you heard about, without actually playing it.

[Downunderwonder]

6 hours ago, Thump said:

How does something like that even happen? who could possibly have thought that is a good idea?!?

 

This happens in many industries. The venue knows they are in the position to deny access to vendors. A tame captive crew is ripe for taxation.

 

On the other hand the vendor is free to add to his quote for a taxing venue. The venue has to be extra good to make up for the inflated prices being charged.

 

The venue banks on them being the best so the best vendors are happy to charge a bit more or eat the tax on their significant fee to get in. If neither is true they wind up with 2nd or 3rd tier vendors and their own status falls.

 

This naturally favours monopoly venues such as stadiums, airports, destinations, and the big in demand function venues.

[Kmoleguru]

We had a similar issue once, and it turned out the venue staff just didn’t fully get what we needed. Took a direct chat with the manager to sort it.

[Dan Dare]

If I'm reading this correctly, it appears the venue wants 10% for recommending bands to those who book the place if those bands actually get a booking. Given that agents charge at least that in commission, it doesn't seem too bad.

 

Perhaps I'm missing something.

[TimR]

4 hours ago, Dan Dare said:

If I'm reading this correctly, it appears the venue wants 10% for recommending bands to those who book the place if those bands actually get a booking. Given that agents charge at least that in commission, it doesn't seem too bad.

 

Perhaps I'm missing something.

 

Yes. Quite.

 

2022 post so presumably post pandemic. Venues were trying anything to recoup losses back then. 

[Uncle Rodney]

On 13/07/2022 at 17:50, NancyJohnson said:

... snip snip..

..staggered to find out that venues insist their on-site caterers take card payments (no cash) and that you use one of the venue card machines during the event.  End of the day the venue takes - are you sitting down here - 25% of all takings put through the card machine.  Shocker.

 

I have found wedding venues to be greedy without shame. Even some of the staff are on the "take" - that kind of greed culture breeds more of the same. For example, if a waiter knows the boss/manager is taking a slice (£) they will try it too, although will be more careful about it. 

 

Personally I avoid playing weddings, way too messy, all that emotion, bad tempered/stressed guests etc. Also the band are supposed to keep mouth shut and take the abuse as it's someone's "special day" when normally the band would respond in kind.

[SimonK]

I think it is an example of trying to keep their headline rate down while still having increased income. Something AirBnB, budget airlines (among many others) do wherein the headline cost is quite low to attract the business but then they hit you with all the extra charges.

 

I think the trick is to ensure the extra charges slide under the radar becasuse if they get publicly exposed - like here - there is a PR beating!

 

Thus said I wonder if they would have got away with maybe a 5% charge with less criticism...

[Dan Dare]

4 hours ago, SimonK said:

I think it is an example of trying to keep their headline rate down while still having increased income. Something AirBnB, budget airlines (among many others) do wherein the headline cost is quite low to attract the business but then they hit you with all the extra charges.

 

I think the trick is to ensure the extra charges slide under the radar because if they get publicly exposed - like here - there is a PR beating!

 

Thus said I wonder if they would have got away with maybe a 5% charge with less criticism...

 

If an agent books out a band, he/she will charge - usually 15%, sometimes more - on top of the band's fee. So how is it different that a venue asks for 10% for recommending a band? If the band doesn't get the booking, it (and the customer) won't pay, so what's the problem?

Edited 1 hour ago by Dan Dare