Well, it's happened. Event cancelled due to Covid

[DJ Jules]

So....

It's happened, I've had an event cancel (birthday party) at 24hrs notice due to the Birthday girl and her son testing positive for Covid. The partner has emailed me to inform me and has contradicted himself in the email (I'm the first supplier he's notified he says, but they've lost a lot due to the cancellation).

In normal circumstances I'd be reasonably sympathetic, but this one has been giving me the run around for the balance of the fee since Saturday with repeated promises of payment that haven't been fulfilled.

Call me a cynic, but this one just feels off. It's also an outright cancellation, not a postponement.

How would you handle this? Ask for evidence of a positive PCR test? Does the positive test even matter for contractual purposes?

Julian

[Benny Smyth]

So....

It's happened, I've had an event cancel (birthday party) at 24hrs notice due to the Birthday girl and her son testing positive for Covid. The partner has emailed me to inform me and has contradicted himself in the email (I'm the first supplier he's notified he says, but they've lost a lot due to the cancellation).

In normal circumstances I'd be reasonably sympathetic, but this one has been giving me the run around for the balance of the fee since Saturday with repeated promises of payment that haven't been fulfilled.

Call me a cynic, but this one just feels off. It's also an outright cancellation, not a postponement.

How would you handle this? Ask for evidence of a positive PCR test? Does the positive test even matter for contractual purposes?

Julian

Entirely depends on what your contract says, but as you can still provide your services, it's a standard cancellation. Seeing test results or asking for a urine sample makes no difference at all - the contract is not frustrated, and it's up to their event insurance to compensate them for their losses.

[Excalibur]

Hmmmm. I had one not dissimilar, but it was a Sunday afternoon, and weeks not days notice. Allegedly birthday girl had had numerous hospital stays, and didn't feel up to it. Maybe genuine, maybe not, but I didn't feel I'd lost a lot, so let it go.

Sounds like yours is definitely iffy. Now as Benny says, you could still provide your services, but you could be playing to an empty room, as nobody would knowingly sign up for ten days quarantine having been near a positive case. ( Would they? )

I certainly wouldn't return any more money here than I had to, Julian.

[DJ Jules]

I certainly wouldn't return any more money here than I had to, Julian.

The problem I have with this one is that it booked relatively last minute (13th Sept) so I relaxed my usual month for payment of the balance to a week (half of the time left before the party). And I've had numerous empty promises about that payment since it became due, culminating in cancellation today.

It's doubly frustrating because its Disco, Photobooth and numbers so they've been blocking both disco and photobooth bookings, it's left suppliers and staff out of pocket and it's also a sizable chunk of money involved.

I think I'll be stood outside the venue tomorrow night, just to check how sick they are.

Julian

[ppentertainments]

Iffy or not, I think you need to treat it how you would if someone tried to cancel due to any other illness.

[DJ Jules]

Iffy or not, I think you need to treat it how you would if someone tried to cancel due to any other illness.

Interestingly the venue have confirmed that the party has been cancelled.

So maybe I am just overly cynical.

Julian

[DJ Jules]

I never posted an update on this. After a bit of back and forth for a few days I established that the customer was genuine and did have Covid. She then proceeded to rebook for a date 3 weeks away from the original. Unfortunately it was a date that I was already booked for, but other elements of the booking were available, so I lined up someone to cover the DJ aspect and moved the booking date.

Now here's the twist... At this point she STILL had not paid the balance so when I moved the date I made it clear that I would not be holding any of the services until I received the balance. In this case that also meant not holding the DJ I had lined up as I had little faith in her paying, having been given the run around and lots of empty promises for 2 weeks prior.

6 days and 2 reminders later, just 10 days out from the party, she finally pays the balance. But by this point the other DJ had found another gig so I had to reply to tell her that she was basically too late and that I could provide the other services and refund her for the Disco or cancel the booking and refund her for everything (keeping the deposit).

30mins later I saw the party come out on both Bark and AddToEvent.

3 days later (now just a week from the party) I get an email with some very dodgy maths, accusing me of over charging her for the other services (basically double counting the deposit) and having a go for letting her down. I replied quite politely, but with no mercy. Summary of the email:
- Correction of the maths to prove I wasn't ripping her off
- I am honouring package discounts and still giving a good discounts on list prices, despite no longer having all the services
- I did tell her this could happen if payment wasn't prompt
- Slightly unprofessional, but I said that I had little faith in her paying, based on her track record to date, and that I wasn't prepared to put my money on the line with a subcontractor without her money in the bank
- Contractually, I can keep all of her money for the previous cancellation
- I'm trying to be fair, you're not making it easy
- Do you want a partial or full refund.

Reply was a single line asking for a full refund, so that's what I did. The last time I checked (24hrs before the party) both the disco and photobooth listings on AddToEvent and Bark had no replies.

I did also email the venue to explain what had happened and that I would no longer be attending. I'm sure in her mind it was all my fault.

Julian