It’s Tricky to Drive Around…
When surrounded by so many moving parts, and so many vendors and people, it’s easy to assume that some THING will go wrong. And let’s face it, normally there is something that doesn’t go according to plan during any wedding. It’s the planner/coordinator’s job to find that one thing, assess the situation and help solve it, hopefully without the clients ever knowing/stressing about it. In fact, I rarely get my clients involved in anything on the day of unless necessary.
One part of the planning process that I have found to be a bit tricky is transportation. Booking and managing transportation is the easy part. Keeping track of moving objects on the day of is the hard bit. I have learned my lesson the hard way (translation: late transportation) during one particular wedding. We were looking for the shuttle car to take guests back to the hotel and, despite our best efforts, it was nowhere to be found! The only way to contact the driver was through a dispatch service (which took forever). This particular situation really gutted me because I made sure to confirm the transportation details about a week prior to the wedding.
Lesson Learned: confirm, double confirm, and triple confirm the transportation logistics before the wedding date. If possible, obtain contact information for your specific driver on the day-of.
Pro Tip: Many times, transportation companies don’t have the contact information for the driver until the day of the wedding, or don’t give it to clients. When booking transit, ask the sales associate if you’ll have the actual driver’s contact information, or if you’ll have to go through “dispatch” to communicate with the driver of the vehicle. If it is through dispatch, maybe choose a different transportation company that has more flexibility and accountability. If you do need to follow up again to obtain contact information for the driver on the day of the wedding, it’s absolutely worth it to take the time on the morning of, and call/email the company to get that info. Trust.