Breach of contract with wedding vendor

[albey75]

What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? New York

Hello,

My wife and I paid for video services for our wedding and events prior to it such as preperation. Almost five months later and after many attempts of contact, the vendor admitted to losing the vast majority of footage to due technical issues with their hardrive. It turns out they lost the footage two months ago and just admitted to losing it since they were trying to retrieve it. The company also admitted that this has happened to several of their clients wedding footage in some cases losing the entire event.Why would an established business working in the wedding industry for over a decade not backup their information and files? In terms of the footage, they only have the reception or parts of it. They agreed to provide us the video of this and a full refund for the service which we are still waiting on. My question is can anything else be done? My wife and I paid 30k for our wedding and hired someone to provide and document our complete wedding. The contract states that we should have the completed version no later than five months of our whole wedding.This has to be a breach of contract right? To make matters worse, this instance has dragged up previous issues we have had with other aspects of the wedding. My wife ended up missing time from work due to chest pains the very next day after we were told this. I just feel like we should be compensated much more for their oversights and neglect. We can never get back what they lost from a once in a lifetime event. I would appreciate any thoughts or legal advice.

 

[Zigner]

What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? New York

Hello,

My wife and I paid for video services for our wedding and events prior to it such as preperation. Almost five months later and after many attempts of contact, the vendor admitted to losing the vast majority of footage to due technical issues with their hardrive. It turns out they lost the footage two months ago and just admitted to losing it since they were trying to retrieve it. The company also admitted that this has happened to several of their clients wedding footage in some cases losing the entire event.Why would an established business working in the wedding industry for over a decade not backup their information and files? In terms of the footage, they only have the reception or parts of it. They agreed to provide us the video of this and a full refund for the service which we are still waiting on. My question is can anything else be done? My wife and I paid 30k for our wedding and hired someone to provide and document our complete wedding. The contract states that we should have the completed version no later than five months of our whole wedding.This has to be a breach of contract right? To make matters worse, this instance has dragged up previous issues we have had with other aspects of the wedding. My wife ended up missing time from work due to chest pains the very next day after we were told this. I just feel like we should be compensated much more for their oversights and neglect. We can never get back what they lost from a once in a lifetime event. I would appreciate any thoughts or legal advice.

I think their offer is very reasonable. I guess the alternative would be for you to stage another ceremony (on your dime) and ask them to come video it for free.

 

[albey75]

I think their offer is very reasonable. I guess the alternative would be for you to stage another ceremony (on your dime) and ask them to come video it for free.

I am sorry but I do not feel like that is reasonable. What you suggested would basically constitue a complete redo of the whole event, which is what we lost. The finanical cost and time expense to that is just not realistic. Why should we have to pay for their mistake? It is simple business practice to backup and files and documents which they failed to do. You would be right if this were a simply event with less finanical investment but considering the cirmstances i disagree. Any other feedback would be valued.

 

[Zigner]

I am sorry but I do not feel like that is reasonable. What you suggested would basically constitue a complete redo of the whole event, which is what we lost. The finanical cost and time expense to that is just not realistic. Why should we have to pay for their mistake? It is simple business practice to backup and files and documents which they failed to do. You would be right if this were a simply event with less finanical investment but considering the cirmstances i disagree. Any other feedback would be valued.

The point I am making is that they have offered to refund all of your money AND let you keep a fair amount of their work product to boot. The things you are complaining about really can't be assigned a dollar value, which is why such liquidated damages are usually spelled out in the contract.

And, while it's true that folks should back up their machines properly, far fewer folks actually do back up their machines properly than you would think.

 

[albey75]

The point I am making is that they have offered to refund all of your money AND let you keep a fair amount of their work product to boot. The things you are complaining about really can't be assigned a dollar value, which is why such liquidated damages are usually spelled out in the contract.

And, while it's true that folks should back up their machines properly, far fewer folks actually do back up their machines properly than you would think.

I have reviewed the contract and there is no mention of liquidated damages. I am no law expert by far but we can place value on the cost of the event? Can we not sue for a portion of that even.l? What about emotional distress even, my wife just just diagnosed with an anxiety disorder due to their shortcomings and she has no documented instances of mental problems before. Plus we will be getting less than half the event total and the protions that are missing were the whole reason we hired the service in the first place. What about small claims court even?

 

[Zigner]

I have reviewed the contract and there is no mention of liquidated damages. I am no law expert by far but we can place value on the cost of the event? Can we not sue for a portion of that even.l? What about emotional distress even, my wife just just diagnosed with an anxiety disorder due to their shortcomings and she has no documented instances of mental problems before. Plus we will be getting less than half the event total and the protions that are missing were the whole reason we hired the service in the first place. What about small claims court even?

You could sue for the value of the service that you didn't get...except for the fact that it's already been refunded. At this point, you have no actual damages.

 

[albey75]

You could sue for the value of the service that you didn't get...except for the fact that it's already been refunded. At this point, you have no actual damages.

What about the expense and time to redue the whole event? Could we sue for the cost of that?

 

[tranquility]

What about the expense and time to redue the whole event? Could we sue for the cost of that?

We all get it. It was an important day and you wanted and paid to have memories recorded and they lost them through negligence. You feel hurt. We all agree you were hurt. But, it is not really a hurt that is compensible through the courts. It is what is called consequential damages. While possible, the courts don't really like to award damages that are not really foreseeable and specifically envisioned in a contract. There is no way people would contract if the limits of liability was infinite. Also, there is the problem of proving your damages. How much were you hurt? In money. Litigating over such matters will tie up the courts forever with no real societal benefit. I go to buy a pencil to take a fill in the blank test and the pencil fails through your negligence so I don't pass the class and don't get the grade to go into medical school so don't become a doctor so don't make the amount of money I expected, so sue you. We all agree your chain is far more reasonable and much less of a reach, still, at what point do we cut the chain of causation?

 

[Zigner]

I would suggest that your wife's troubles run much deeper if this one relatively minor incident (when taken in the grand scheme of life) is enough to give her some sort of breakdown. You should both work with a therapist to help her better cope with the curveballs that life will throw at you.

Best of luck to you.