Emma B. Sent on 26/11/2023
-
Quality of the service
4.0 out of 5 rating
-
Response time
3.0 out of 5 rating
-
Professionalism
3.0 out of 5 rating
-
Value for money
3.0 out of 5 rating
-
Flexibility
4.0 out of 5 rating
Beautiful beach wedding venue with some improvements required
We had a magical wedding day at Oxwich Bay Hotel on Thursday 6th July 2023. We booked our wedding in May 2022 after having a private tour of the venue with Charlotte in April 2022. We were able to ask lots of questions during the tour. Charlotte was very helpful. We also received a brochure when we made our initial inquiry which was very detailed and gave information on the various packages and pricing structures and also the menu options.
We were told we could contact the wedding team at any time in the planning process whenever we had any questions. We did contact them frequently about a number of different things and most of the time our questions were answered within 24 hours which was very efficient and we felt that everyone on the wedding team was very helpful and friendly in their responses. It was a bit difficult to know who was part of the wedding team as our questions were answered by a number of different people. We did occasionally receive some inconsistent information and we didn't receive any information on which staff members at the hotel were actually part of the wedding team. This would have been helpful. At no stage were we assigned a specific wedding planner and we were only told which member of the wedding team would be running our day 2 weeks before our wedding.
We do feel that a lot of the questions we had to ask were things that could have been included in an information pack which it would have been useful to receive when we booked the wedding. For example, we asked at one point about decorations and were then told that the hotel had a lot of decorations which we could use and we received photos of them. This was really useful information which we should have received when we booked rather than months afterwards.
We were invited to a menu tasting well in advance of our wedding. We went in January and were able to bring an additional person (at an extra cost). This helped us try more options. The menu tasting was very well organised and we really enjoyed everything we tried. We had a meeting with Charlotte afterwards and finalised our menu options. We were able to ask a lot of questions and the meeting was very helpful.
We only had one other meeting with a member of the wedding team before our wedding. We had been told that we would be contacted to arrange the meeting and that it would take place around 6 weeks before the wedding. We actually had to contact the wedding team to arrange the meeting as no one contacted us. We did manage to get a meeting booked in for just under 6 weeks before our wedding. However, we felt this was a bit too close to the wedding as there were still a lot of things to be discussed at this stage.
Overall, the planning process was much more stressful than it should have been due to inconsistent information provided, which meant we had a lot of questions to ask during our final meeting in order to seek clarity. Sophie was extremely helpful and patient with us during this meeting. We would like to thank her for all her time.
Regarding our payments, we were given a timeline for the payments when we booked. However, we actually had to ask to make the payments as we were not contacted. It seemed as though a new timeline was implemented after we booked and some members of the team were not aware of when we were supposed to make our payments. This was a bit confusing.
There was also some confusion regarding accommodation. We were given a sheet with all the accommodation options and were told we could fill this out with the names and contact details of our guests who wanted accommodation. We sent the sheet with all the details to the hotel 3 months before our wedding date, as requested. The sheet stated that guests had to phone up to pay for their accommodation by card over the phone. However, it was not until one of our relatives phoned up to do so that we were informed this was the wrong information and that payment had to be made online. It turned out that when we sent the sheet, a member of the wedding team should have sent emails out to all our guests who booked accommodation with a link to pay online. This was not done and we ended up giving wrong information to our guests which was a bit embarrassing. We were also given incorrect information about the prices of the accommodation. The prices on the sheet we were given were incorrect.
There was also an issue with people getting locked out of their rooms on the morning of our wedding. Our guests who were staying the night before our wedding had booked this online themselves and then the night of our wedding through us on our accommodation sheet. The two nights did not seem to be linked up in the system and the key cards stopped working at 10.30 on the wedding morning. This caused a lot of confusion and we feel this should have been organised more efficiently.
We were very grateful that we were allowed access to the marquee the afternoon before our wedding as there was no wedding being held that day. We were able to lay out a lot of our table decorations and place names which was great. Any instructions we gave the team regarding things we were not able to lay out the day before were followed very closely so we were pleased with this attention to detail.
Our wedding day itself ran very smoothly. We loved how the Chestnut Room looked for our ceremony. It is a beautiful room and our florist, Bec Flowers, did an amazing job of decorating it. The garden in front of the hotel was lovely for our group photo after the ceremony with the beach and sea in the background! We were very lucky with the weather and had lots of photos taken on the beach after the ceremony and also in the evening. The location right by the beach was one of the main reasons we chose the Oxwich Bay Hotel and we are so pleased with our photos which were taken by Karl Baker.
Our drinks reception with prosecco and canapés went very well. The food for the meal was also excellent. It was served very quickly and many of our guests commented on how amazing the food was. There was plenty of food and it was all presented very nicely. We had been told that tea or coffee with mints would be served after the meal. However, this did not happen. We did not ask about this at the time as we were busy going round speaking to all our guests, but we feel this should have been offered to our guests as it was included in the price of our package.
Another thing that we were told was included in our package was a master of ceremonies. However, for some reason this was not the case for our wedding. Our best man was asked to do this instead. This was not really an issue, but we do feel we should have been told this in advance so we could have given him more warning that he was going to be doing the role of introducing us into the room.
We were really pleased with how our evening reception went. We had a ceilidh band called Banshee which we would highly recommend! The dance floor in the marquee is not that big, but there was still plenty of space around it for the ceilidh dancing. The Oxwich Bay Hotel in house DJ took over at 10pm. He was very good. We had been in contact with him in the run up to our wedding and provided him with a playlist. He did play most of the songs on our playlist which was great.
The evening buffet food was fantastic and went down very well with our guests. We had put together a photo sideshow that we wanted to be shown while the buffet was out. We had informed the wedding team about this and it was noted on our wedding details sheet. We were told we would have to bring our own laptop to show the sideshow on a projector. However, with everything going on, we didn't remember about this until later on in the evening. It was a shame that a member of the Oxwich Bay Hotel staff didn't remind us about this.
Overall, we feel that some things could have been more efficient and there was a lack of attention to detail in a few cases and a lack of clarity which seemed to be down to changes in processes and team members in the run up to our wedding. However, we would like to stress that we had a fantastic wedding day and we would definitely recommend Oxwich Bay Hotel as a wedding venue! The location is absolutely amazing! We would like to thank the team again for all their dedication and for giving us a very special and memorable wedding day.
We had a magical wedding day at Oxwich Bay Hotel on Thursday 6th July 2023. We booked our wedding in May 2022 after having a private tour of the venue with Charlotte in April 2022. We were able to ask lots of questions during the tour. Charlotte was very helpful. We also received a brochure when we made our initial inquiry which was very detailed and gave information on the various packages and pricing structures and also the menu options.
We were told we could contact the wedding team at any time in the planning process whenever we had any questions. We did contact them frequently about a number of different things and most of the time our questions were answered within 24 hours which was very efficient and we felt that everyone on the wedding team was very helpful and friendly in their responses. It was a bit difficult to know who was part of the wedding team as our questions were answered by a number of different people. We did occasionally receive some inconsistent information and we didn't receive any information on which staff members at the hotel were actually part of the wedding team. This would have been helpful. At no stage were we assigned a specific wedding planner and we were only told which member of the wedding team would be running our day 2 weeks before our wedding.
We do feel that a lot of the questions we had to ask were things that could have been included in an information pack which it would have been useful to receive when we booked the wedding. For example, we asked at one point about decorations and were then told that the hotel had a lot of decorations which we could use and we received photos of them. This was really useful information which we should have received when we booked rather than months afterwards.
We were invited to a menu tasting well in advance of our wedding. We went in January and were able to bring an additional person (at an extra cost). This helped us try more options. The menu tasting was very well organised and we really enjoyed everything we tried. We had a meeting with Charlotte afterwards and finalised our menu options. We were able to ask a lot of questions and the meeting was very helpful.
We only had one other meeting with a member of the wedding team before our wedding. We had been told that we would be contacted to arrange the meeting and that it would take place around 6 weeks before the wedding. We actually had to contact the wedding team to arrange the meeting as no one contacted us. We did manage to get a meeting booked in for just under 6 weeks before our wedding. However, we felt this was a bit too close to the wedding as there were still a lot of things to be discussed at this stage.
Overall, the planning process was much more stressful than it should have been due to inconsistent information provided, which meant we had a lot of questions to ask during our final meeting in order to seek clarity. Sophie was extremely helpful and patient with us during this meeting. We would like to thank her for all her time.
Regarding our payments, we were given a timeline for the payments when we booked. However, we actually had to ask to make the payments as we were not contacted. It seemed as though a new timeline was implemented after we booked and some members of the team were not aware of when we were supposed to make our payments. This was a bit confusing.
There was also some confusion regarding accommodation. We were given a sheet with all the accommodation options and were told we could fill this out with the names and contact details of our guests who wanted accommodation. We sent the sheet with all the details to the hotel 3 months before our wedding date, as requested. The sheet stated that guests had to phone up to pay for their accommodation by card over the phone. However, it was not until one of our relatives phoned up to do so that we were informed this was the wrong information and that payment had to be made online. It turned out that when we sent the sheet, a member of the wedding team should have sent emails out to all our guests who booked accommodation with a link to pay online. This was not done and we ended up giving wrong information to our guests which was a bit embarrassing. We were also given incorrect information about the prices of the accommodation. The prices on the sheet we were given were incorrect.
There was also an issue with people getting locked out of their rooms on the morning of our wedding. Our guests who were staying the night before our wedding had booked this online themselves and then the night of our wedding through us on our accommodation sheet. The two nights did not seem to be linked up in the system and the key cards stopped working at 10.30 on the wedding morning. This caused a lot of confusion and we feel this should have been organised more efficiently.
We were very grateful that we were allowed access to the marquee the afternoon before our wedding as there was no wedding being held that day. We were able to lay out a lot of our table decorations and place names which was great. Any instructions we gave the team regarding things we were not able to lay out the day before were followed very closely so we were pleased with this attention to detail.
Our wedding day itself ran very smoothly. We loved how the Chestnut Room looked for our ceremony. It is a beautiful room and our florist, Bec Flowers, did an amazing job of decorating it. The garden in front of the hotel was lovely for our group photo after the ceremony with the beach and sea in the background! We were very lucky with the weather and had lots of photos taken on the beach after the ceremony and also in the evening. The location right by the beach was one of the main reasons we chose the Oxwich Bay Hotel and we are so pleased with our photos which were taken by Karl Baker.
Our drinks reception with prosecco and canapés went very well. The food for the meal was also excellent. It was served very quickly and many of our guests commented on how amazing the food was. There was plenty of food and it was all presented very nicely. We had been told that tea or coffee with mints would be served after the meal. However, this did not happen. We did not ask about this at the time as we were busy going round speaking to all our guests, but we feel this should have been offered to our guests as it was included in the price of our package.
Another thing that we were told was included in our package was a master of ceremonies. However, for some reason this was not the case for our wedding. Our best man was asked to do this instead. This was not really an issue, but we do feel we should have been told this in advance so we could have given him more warning that he was going to be doing the role of introducing us into the room.
We were really pleased with how our evening reception went. We had a ceilidh band called Banshee which we would highly recommend! The dance floor in the marquee is not that big, but there was still plenty of space around it for the ceilidh dancing. The Oxwich Bay Hotel in house DJ took over at 10pm. He was very good. We had been in contact with him in the run up to our wedding and provided him with a playlist. He did play most of the songs on our playlist which was great.
The evening buffet food was fantastic and went down very well with our guests. We had put together a photo sideshow that we wanted to be shown while the buffet was out. We had informed the wedding team about this and it was noted on our wedding details sheet. We were told we would have to bring our own laptop to show the sideshow on a projector. However, with everything going on, we didn't remember about this until later on in the evening. It was a shame that a member of the Oxwich Bay Hotel staff didn't remind us about this.
Overall, we feel that some things could have been more efficient and there was a lack of attention to detail in a few cases and a lack of clarity which seemed to be down to changes in processes and team members in the run up to our wedding. However, we would like to stress that we had a fantastic wedding day and we would definitely recommend Oxwich Bay Hotel as a wedding venue! The location is absolutely amazing! We would like to thank the team again for all their dedication and for giving us a very special and memorable wedding day.
