Quote Originally Posted by DJ Jules View Post
IThe reason I went back over the guidance was to try and get a definitive answer about whether fixed costs were allowed to be included when calculating "Covid19" refunds - as one of the wedding industry action groups shared a guest blog from a photographer posted on Stanford Gould's website that contradicted advice that Heather Stanford gave in the early days of lockdown. I don't know if anyone else knows the answer to that question?
Unfortunately, the only time you get a 'definitive' answer is in court.

Only a judge can determine. And because this is an unprecedented situation, I don't think there are any precedents in place for this. Until someone goes to court over it, we won't know.

Fixed costs are a very grey area - and typically aren't permitted to be included, because the argument is that those cost weren't incured by the person booking you - the costs were there regardless of whether they had booked or not. Where as responding to emails after the booking was set up is a cost that only occurred because of the booking, so is directly attributed to the booking, and therefore easy to charge. A venue for example may have provided a meal tasting session, and a photographer may have done a pre-wedding photo shoot. Both of those are chargeable, and arguably more tangible.

It should make us start to look at how we've arrived at our prices, and what the input for those prices are, so they are easier to break down in the future. Sending out something tangible that has a value can also help.

For example, Derek Pengelly's now defunct book 'Wedding Day Secrets' could be posted out along with their booking confirmation, and their login details to their online planning system. You could then argue that the value of setting up their online booking system login and providing the book have a value of £100 in total. It's then easier to justify the deposit. It only takes a couple of emails early on to take the cost up to £150.

I'd suggest looking at past bookings and considering:

Time spent setting up the booking/providing assistance in the run up to the day
Cost of Equipment Hire
Hourly rate on the day

The problem is, when you do this, it often just highlights how low the rate of a DJ is.

Try and hire a DJ kit for the evening - I think you'd be looking at around £300.

Add on 5 hours performance, plus an hour setting up/taking down and travel to/from the venue - let's say 8 hours in total at £35/hour = £280

You're likely spending around 4-5 hours minimum preparing the event, answering emails from the person who booked you etc = £175

So we arrive at a fee of £755 for a typical evening function...

** Edit **

Hey, we must be getting close to normality - I've managed to turn this into a pricing thread