Your Wedding Photographer Canceled on You.

What Do You Do?

If you are finding this you might be searching for what you should do after your photographer cancels on you.  It might have been a last minute cancelation but what we have heard is that most often it is a ‘family emergency’ and in advance of the wedding.  We are writing this not because we ever have or ever will cancel on one of our wedding couples but rather that we keep hearing this happen to couples.  It is becoming so common that we think we might need to start measuring the number of couples who came to us because their photographer dropped them.  Here are a couple of options of what you can do:

Proactive: Search for a New Photographer

Taking a proactive approach to resolving your problem is by far the best approach.  If you were dumped then it likely was inconvenient and you are now behind the curve of availability of photographers to quality photographers.  If you have a weekend date things are also going to be hard to find a replacement so the best thing you can do is get all funds to be returned to you and put those toward a new photographer.  If you did not pay a deposit then you should know you either were not booked or did not have commitment 2 ways.  There will be someone else that will come with a chunk of money whereas with you all they have to lose is the potential of some money.  You could easily cancel on them without cause so the deposit is the key to getting commitment from both parties. If you did have a deposit make sure you get it back if they canceled on you.  We need to note here that we are not saying you take a vendors date and then should expect any refund.  All funds received by the photographer should be non refundable otherwise the deposit is pointless and you could be canceled on as nothing is holding the date.  The main idea is look for someone who runs their business well.  If you liked that they did not have certain things like a deposit, that big of a deposit, or a easy to get out of booking then know it might run 2 ways as there is nothing to commit them.  Hate that this is a lot about money but many couples are seeking to spend the least amount for the most amount of quality.  This makes this be a fine line.

Reactive: Go After Their Business

All that a reactive approach will do is make you feel better and functionally waste your time.  When reading about this scenario happening to others online about a 3rd of people push for this approach but the reality is that in almost every situation a review will not really hurt their business because there is not much of a business.  Everyone is a photographer today but very few are living off of the income which is what we would call being an actual professional.  Most are treating the business a hobby on the side therefore are not losing much if they miss out on those funds.  In the case of a review you may not even find much of an online presence or at least a quality one of consistent top rated reviews with lots of awesome things to say.  On top of that we advocate for your saving your time because unless there is a contract or proof of payment it can easily be taken down from certain review locations.  Taking a legal approach may seem good on the surface but really you will spend more going after them then what you are likely losing on the bad business deal.  If they give everything back there is still damage but how do you quantify it?  If they do not refund you then it is likely going to cost you more to go after it then to just suck it up and move on.  In the end if you are booking with an actual business it will be extremely clear how you book, when you are booked, and that the commitment is 2 ways.  If the business canceled on you in 99% of the circumstances it was not an actual business.

What is the Problem?

The problem is either you or the photographer.  Not some external circumstance.

What?  “You”

You are saying I am the problem?  No – The photographer is definitely the problem but we would be amiss to not express that you might be a contributing factor to why they canceled on you.  Years ago we had someone come to us saying that their wedding photographer canceled on them a month before their wedding for the classic ‘family emergency’.  We wrote them back and advised them we were already booked and that it was going to be hard to find someone for the peak weekend date.  The result was them writing us back an email full of expletives.  We get it is stressful but if your initial reaction is going off on a stranger you might have caused your own problem in some other way along the way with that photographer that canceled.  What is likely the more subtile way of being a contributing factor is having excessive expectations that keep coming out on the back end after booking.  In life you want to get the most service or product for the least amount of money.  There are limitations to that being a positive thing when you start putting unrealistic expectations on someone.

The Photographer

This is the majority of the problem in almost all circumstances.  It is how they run their “business” or their ethics of life.  We have touched on the how someone runs a business a little above.  If you did not get a clear contract with a non refundable significantly sized deposit then you did not get a two way commitment.  If they said they have been doing this for a while but you do not see a regular flow of blogs being posted on their website or if the blogs do not fit the season when they were posted then they are doing this on the side as a hobby.  People change hobbies all the time and do them because they are fun.  We also think ethics can be a large part of it.  We have never and will never cancel on someone for their wedding.  We would not want someone to do that to us and so we will not do that to someone else.  If we say we will do something we will do it.  If we commit to you we will hold up our end of the commitment.  If expectations are off we will work with you to figure out how to meet those expectations or how we can adjust them if they are not realistic.  Culturally there is this flippant attitude toward work commitments and we think this is a huge contributing factor to why this kind of thing happens.

No 3rd Category

How many times have we heard of a family emergency?  90%?  Unless someone is giving specifics about the circumstance then is them just trying to soften the blow with being vague.  You are sharing your wedding day with them so it being too personal is a cover up for a partial truth.  If it were a true family emergency they would say ‘my dad just got diagnosed with terminal lung cancer, is across the country in New York, and I will be flying there to be with him for an unknown amount of time.’  The real professional would then follow by saying they think they will be back in time but if not then they will allow you to find someone else and would provide all the funds back if needed.  We have only heard of a cancelation being days before once.  The point is that you can find a way to make good on your commitments and will do that if you are running a real business.  Perhaps this is why we have never heard of couples with sizable budgets getting canceled on.  While increasing the budget may not hurt the budget is not the problem.  The problem is a person and most people that are the problem will pass off the problem to be something else to save face.

A Friends Post on Social Media from Experience 7 Years ago:

A few months before our wedding,  things fell through with our original photographer. We had to quickly find anyone who was available and in our price range (which wasn’t a lot since we were paying for the wedding ourselves)…we paid for a photographer but ended up not liking a single picture to buy.  Not having professional photos as a keepsake of our wedding day is still something that makes me sad. When I see recent weddings captured with beautiful photos come up on my newsfeed I often get a tiny bit envious and saddened by our lack thereof. Joe will sweetly remind me…the “wedding” and the pictures are not what is important. What is important is US! That we have eachother! 

Where Do You Go From Here?

Just finding someone might be your goal but we think you should look for someone different.  Even if the next person does not cancel on you the problem related to their canceling was that their business was not well run.  Our belief is that you will likely experience it in some other way most likely on the back end with what you get.  At that point it will be too late.  Below is a post on how to find a good photographer written to help you know the qualities of the best photographers.  If you need some thoughts on the budget end of things we have Colorado market pricing listed here for your reference.