Newlyweds Send Bill To Guests Who Were No-Shows For Their Wedding

Never mess with an about-to-be-married couple who have already paid their non-refundable deposit

Weddings are fun, right? You’ve got the champers, the cake, the toasts, the happily ever after, and starry-eyed romanticism. It’s a day filled with love, hope, and possibility. All that possibility adds up, however: with apologies to Jennifer Lopez, love may not cost a thing, but weddings are very expensive.

The now newly-married couple Douglas Simmons and Dedra McGee (now Simmons – congrats, guys!) knew their wedding would be spendy, and that was a price they were willing to pay…if everyone who RSVP’d actually showed up. But some of their guests declined to actually come to the couple’s destination wedding.

Yep, some of the guests didn’t show – and now the newlyweds drummed up a $240 bill to recover their costs.

A now-viral photo of the invoice showed up on Twitter with one user commenting, “I don’t think I’ve ever seen a wedding reception invoice before lol.” Sending an invoice for the missed wedding became one of those blue dress/white dress litmus tests: whose side are you on? The couple? Or the wedding guests?

For some background, the Simmons gave the no-show guests an invoice for their Royalton Negril Resort & Spa wedding in Jamaica. The festivities cost $120 per person, as the thoughtfully rendered invoice stated.

The groom told The New York Post that the no-shows,“made me feel some kind of way.”

“This invoice is being sent to you because you confirmed seat(s) at the wedding reception during the Final Headcount,” the note (which was posted to Doug’s Facebook account) reads, “Because you didn’t call or give us proper notice that you wouldn’t be in attendance, this amount is what you owe us for paying for your seat(s) in advance. You can pay via Zelle or PayPal. Please reach out to us and let us know which method of payment works for you. Thank you!”

The groom admitted to the Post that yes, he got a “little petty — but I am not some trifling person who is going to bill somebody.” Doug went on to say that it’s not about money — it was already pre-paid. However, the couple felt hurt and disrespected by the guests who didn’t show.

One Twitter user pointed out the seeming uptick in wedding drama.

As for Simmons, he maintains he’s in the right. “Four times we asked [our guests], ‘Are you available to come, can you make it?,’ and they kept saying ‘Yes,’ ” he told the Post. “We had to pay in advance for Jamaica — this was a destination wedding.”

“No one told me or texted me, ‘Hey, we can’t make it,’ ” Simmons said. “That’s all I was asking. If you tell me you can’t make it, I would be understanding — but to tell me nothing, but then let me pay for you and your plus ones? Four people became eight people. I took that personally.”

No word on if the new Simmons family will take payment plans or if the couple now requires payments from the no-shows in one lump sum (seeing as the couple claims some of their guests have a difficult time keeping their word).