Being a wedding guest can be expensive – there’s travel, accommodation, you might even treat yourself to a new outfit – then there’s another cost to factor in: the gift.
It’s now commonplace for invitations to read: “Your presence is enough, but if you would like to give us a gift, please donate to our honeymoon fund.”
But replacing the traditional gift list with bank transfer details, can leave guests with a new etiquette dilemma: how much are you expected to give?
Wedding list service Prezola says it has seen a rise in couples inviting guests to pay for specific experiences rather than a generic cash pot. It says the average guest contribution is £116.
But expectations can vary widely, depending on everything from closeness and culture to the cost of attending.
Johnny, 34, says he and his wife Lottie contribute between £250 and £400 depending on how close they are to the bride and groom and what they can afford at the time.
“We don’t have that many friends, so it’s nice to give generously,” he says.
At his own wedding, most close friends gave between £100 and £200, one couple gave £400 and they received £2,000 from Johnny’s dad.
They used it as spending money on their 17-day honeymoon in Canada which Johnny says they’d saved for “because it’s not worth the risk of relying on donations”.
‘QR codes at the bar’
But not everyone is giving hundreds of pounds.
Hannah Rose-Thorn, 30, says she “always gives £50 in a card” and found that the average contribution to her own honeymoon fund was the same.
Image source, Hannah Rose-Thorn
“We mentioned money on our invitations and also created print-out QR codes for people to scan at the bar,” she says.
She received £3,000 which will be used as spending money for the honeymoon which she had already paid for.
According to Hitched, a UK-based wedding planning website, the average UK couple spends around £4,000 on their honeymoon.
Hannah says she also received physical gifts despite asking for money.
“We got a lot of champagne and some flute glasses from my boss at work, which were nice, but we have a lot of that so it will most likely get regifted,” she says.
Johnny says some wedding guests will ignore the request for money because they want to give something more meaningful.
“They mean well, but it probably means you’ll get a bunch of John Lewis and M&S vouchers, like we did, as well as some physical gifts too,” he says.
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‘Nobody wants a random dish’
Chelsea Chivers, who is getting married in August, takes a stronger view.
“Some people see money as impersonal and think it’s awkward to give but it’s kind of standard now, so either give nothing or give money.
“Nobody wants that random dish.”
She usually gives around £200 for friends and more for family, but says it depends on the wedding – when a friend got married in South Africa, she did not give a gift because attending had already cost thousands.
She often disagrees with her partner on how much to contribute to wedding funds and says he would “give £50 if left to him”.
‘A little impersonal’
Even as cash gifts become more common, not everyone is convinced they make the best wedding presents.
Ollie Hickey, 28, has contributed between £30 and £50 to several honeymoon funds in recent years, but says he finds them “a little impersonal”.
“I like the idea that you can tie something specific to someone who shared your day with you, rather than a pot of money,” he says.
He is not engaged, but has already spoken to his partner about what they might ask for if they get married.
As record collectors, they hope to ask guests to bring a record that brings them joy as “it’s a piece of the people that are part of our special day”.
‘Our guests paid for my IVF’
Not all newlyweds use cash gifts for their honeymoon.
Roxie Westood ended up using money gifted for a honeymoon towards IVF.
Image source, Roxie Westwood
She married abroad in Ibiza and “didn’t expect any gifts”, but guests still gave about £100 per couple.
“We had hoped we’d conceive naturally, but we’d started trying long before our wedding and it wasn’t happening,” she says.
When “reality kicked in”, using the money for IVF felt like the right thing to do. It covered a large chunk of the cost, and she says she is grateful to friends and family for “playing a part” in bringing her son into the world.
Georgia Finch, 26, says she asked for money towards a loft renovation and received £2,500 from 80 guests, which “was amazing” and covered roughly half the cost.
As a wedding guest, Georgia says she likes to contribute cash and particularly liked it when a colleague set up a site where people could pay towards specific honeymoon experiences, such as a couples’ massage, scuba diving or a luxury breakfast.
It made it easier for her to buy an experience as the most she would personally give to a fund at the moment is £20, because “money is tight right now”.
Image source, Georgia Finch
How much to give can also expose cultural differences.
Ewa Lewszyk-Howes says her Polish relatives gave between £250 and £400, while the usual contribution from her husband’s English friends and family was around £100 per couple.
“But that comes with different expectations,” she says, explaining that Polish weddings are often expected to include a large celebration, endless food, an open bar and free accommodation.
“In the UK, guests are more likely to spend that money on travel, hotels, taxis and other costs that come with attending,” she says.
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Image source, Johnny
