What do we do about wedding gifts that were not received??

[Chris2597]

My dd got married a little over a month ago. They had a wedding with 200plus, sit down dinner and dance. She and her hubby were registered at a large retail home store. They are working on their Thank You notes and noticed that a couple of items on their registry list were purchased but not received by them. There are 3 people on the guest list that were at the wedding that we have no record of a gift being received. Two of these people are friends and I can't imagine them showing up without a gift. DD went to the store and was told that it isnt the store's responsibility to make sure the gift arrived, only to sell it...However, most of the gifts and there were many arrived by mail, shipped by the store. What should we do about the gifts that werent received? Should we pursue it further with the store? Should we inquire with the giftless guests ( I am hesitant as I dont want them to feel they have to send a gift if they chose not to). We don't want 2 gifts to go un-acknowledged. Any thoughts??

 

[kilee]

That is a tough one and I'll be interested to see the responses. I honestly don't know. What if on some off chance those people truly did not bring a gift and you ask them about it.

 

[barkley]

do stores these days keep track if an item is purchased from a registry and then returned? i know back when i got married they did'nt and as a result some of the items we registered for appeared to have been purchased which prevented someone else from buying them, but we did'nt receive those items (i suspect in our case the persons ended up deciding after the fact to purchase something else to gift us).

i don't think there's any way for you/your dd to pursue it with the store-only a purchaser could pursue it with a receipt showing it was purchased and then not delivered (if they opted for the store to deliver).

as for the 3 you can't identify gifts to-i would be uncomfortable contacting anyone and asking them directly weather they had/had not gifted me/my dd. it may be the social norm for everyone to give a gift, but that does'nt always happen due to a variety of circumstances and personal choices.

we had about 3 people who attended our wedding that i could'nt identify a gift for, i opted to send them a thank you note that was worded in a manner that would thank them in the event they had given us a gift, but not insult them/make them feel bad if they had'nt-

"thank you for your kindness and generosity in sharing our special day with us".


funny thing is, over 2 years after the fact my mil put on the same suit she wore to our wedding. she reached into the pocket and to her surpise she pulled out an envelope. it was a card that one of those guests had asked her to give us. inside was a cash gift. mil was like and immediatly called the guest (a friend of hers) to tell her what she had discovered and to profusely apologize. the guest told her she never would have known if she had'nt told her because she had received what she perceived as a very heartfelt and appreciate thank you note from us over 2 years prior

 

[Wall-E1]

I don't know the answer to that. It's a difficult situation. I did want to say that your problem would probably make for a very entertaining episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm.

 

[ogreenlee]

The rule is that guests have six months to offer a gift.

 

[barkley]

just for the heck of it i did an etiquette search on this.

according to a couple of sites i found while it's become an accepted current day expectation that a guest attending a wedding provide a gift, there are old traditions that say there is absolutly no obligation.

the sites talked to how to handle thank you notes specificaly in a situation where a person has used the guest list or actual attendance list to cross reference gifts, and can't identify a particular guest with any gift. the sites are unanamous that the guest should NEVER be contacted to ask if they did/did not send a gift or so much as 'what gift did you give'. it's up to the bride/groom as to weather they will send a thank you note that at least thanks them for attending.

the one exception to discussing gifts with a guest appears to be in the event a check is received and it subsequently bounces

 

[Enchanted_Mama]

the one exception to discussing gifts with a guest appears to be in the event a check is received and it subsequently bounces

this happened to us! and, I didn't discover that it bounced until an hour after I had dropped the thank you note in the mail I never said anything, and it was a very generous check ($400). 11 years have gone by, I guess it is too late, huh?

 

[tomthebarncat]

with the other posters, please do not contact the guests and ask where the gift is. Times are hard for a lot of people, and just maybe those guests could not afford a gift!! I did have a bride, I barely knew call me and "Thank me" for a gift, I thought it was strange as I did not send her one and told her so! She then replied that she thought that maybe it had gotten lost in the mail, what nerve! No, I did not attend the wedding and I did decline on the RSVP, so she was clearly fishing for gifts. To be snarky, I did send her a used book on etiquette. Congratulations to the happy couple

 

[DMickey28]

I believer it's actually up to a year from the date of the wedding for a gift to be properly recieved!

Short of pursuing it with the store, I have no idea what to do. I don't really think that you can contact the guests, unless you found a card that specifically mentioned a certain gift that was not recieved! Otherwise, I'd just send a generalized Thank You card to those guests.

 

[nashville_minnie]

do you think there is a possible way to send an e-mail explaining that the couple has had some trouble with their registy store regarding items that were requested to be shipped, you could ask the guests to reply if they did do buy & ship, so that you can make sure you did in fact receive everything?

the e-mail could be kind of vague & sent out to those that you haven't received a gift from along with a few others that are in on your situation so that it doesn't look like the e-mail is pointed directly at the non-gifters.

it would be interesting to see in the non-gifters replied & at least then you'd be able to rule out that option.

As for the "you have six months to give a gift", i have heard that before, but it seems weird to me. Why would you wait to give a gift after you already attended the wedding? Were you waiting to see if the food at the reception was good enough to qualify for a gift? We did get some gifts after our wedding & I just decided that those guests plan everything so last minute, they just didn't get to it in time. Just because I had been planning my wedding for months doesn't mean it was even on their radar until the day of.

 

[puffkin]

I work PT for a large home retailer that does lots of bridal registries. They should be able to look up any gifts that were shipped from your registry. IF they were just bought in the store though, there really is no way of knowing.

When you talk to them, I would just politely ask if they could research it for you as it would be terrible if the registry was not working properly (ie gifts coming off that were never purchased, etc). Trust me, the store takes bridal registries VERY SERIOUSLY

 

[barkley]

with the other posters, please do not contact the guests and ask where the gift is. Times are hard for a lot of people, and just maybe those guests could not afford a gift!! I did have a bride, I barely knew call me and "Thank me" for a gift, I thought it was strange as I did not send her one and told her so! She then replied that she thought that maybe it had gotten lost in the mail, what nerve! No, I did not attend the wedding and I did decline on the RSVP, so she was clearly fishing for gifts. To be snarky, I did send her a used book on etiquette. Congratulations to the happy couple

i'll do you one better-a wedding we were invited to that unfortunatly was schedualed such that the majority of guests on one side had to decline.

in part because it was'nt the common expectation in that region to send a gift if you declined a wedding invite, but i suspect in larger part because the b/g had been hosted (in the region the declining invites lived) over the course of months prior to the wedding several showers, an engagement party and a college grad party which generated gifts that were never aknowledged-the number of wedding gifts apparantly fell far short of what the b/g and one of the parents anticipated.

HERE'S THE TACKY KICKER-the parent takes the list of who was invited and did'nt give a gift (weather they attended or not) and contacts each, personaly by phone to invite them to a pot-luck party at the parent's home. only after the person accepts the invitation does the parent say that the purpose of the pot luck party is to welcome the b/g back from their honeymoon and 'give everyone who has'nt had an opportunity to send their gift YET a chance to deliver it personaly'

that took 'fishing' for gifts to a new level (as in big commercial tanker fishing).

 

[Hillbeans]

maybe people bought the gifts for christmas presents and have not yet been presented yet?

 

[tomthebarncat]

i'll do you one better-a wedding we were invited to that unfortunatly was schedualed such that the majority of guests on one side had to decline.

in part because it was'nt the common expectation in that region to send a gift if you declined a wedding invite, but i suspect in larger part because the b/g had been hosted (in the region the declining invites lived) over the course of months prior to the wedding several showers, an engagement party and a college grad party which generated gifts that were never aknowledged-the number of wedding gifts apparantly fell far short of what the b/g and one of the parents anticipated.

HERE'S THE TACKY KICKER-the parent takes the list of who was invited and did'nt give a gift (weather they attended or not) and contacts each, personaly by phone to invite them to a pot-luck party at the parent's home. only after the person accepts the invitation does the parent say that the purpose of the pot luck party is to welcome the b/g back from their honeymoon and 'give everyone who has'nt had an opportunity to send their gift YET a chance to deliver it personaly'

that took 'fishing' for gifts to a new level (as in big commercial tanker fishing).

Barkley, your stories always put a smile on my face that is just plain rude and I would have had a very hard time being civil to this person on the telephone!

 

[Abbie]

I think the only time you can do any "questioning" is if you end up with extra gifts and have no idea who sent them! I don't think there is any way to politely inquire whether someone sent a gift otherwise.

My DD also was married recently and they still have three gifts unacknowledged because I guess the cards were detached from the package. It kills me that somewhere, three people are probably complaining about not being thanked! Wish I could figure out a gracious way to fix it.

 

[blana]

Another possibility, especially if it was a national registry:

When I was preganant with DS, several people commented to me about how much they appreciated the registry & that they were happy to find just the right thing on there, only for me to then open the gift & it be nothing I had registered for. Finally I realized that another lady had a VERY similar name to me & people had bought items off of the other registry. So, the other lady probably never got certain items, because they showed up as purchased on her registry, yet I had received them. (And certain items off of mine that showed up as purchased never made it to me, so I'm betting she got some things from mine as well.) It could be something along those lines as to why she hasn't received the items.

 

[bumbershoot]

I wouldn't contact the guests you mentioned.

I would keep talking to the store. Surely they can see if the items were bought AT the store (in which case, drop it, b/c for whatever reason the guests didn't bring them) or if they were ordered to be shipped.

If shipped, they can look into the order, even if they can't (and they shouldn't) tell you who ordered it or what happened with the order. Although if they could look at it and see that there was a problem with the shipping, perhaps they could replace the order (as long as they can do a FREE replacement with no charge/refund to the giver). But if they see it was an order where something went wrong, they should have the giver's info, and possibly could send an email "your order for the couple had a shipping problem, please call us so we can re-send it" or something like that.

This doesn't seem to be an issue of people deciding to take up to a year to give a gift; this seems to be an issue with the registry store. So have the couple continue talking with them.

 

[barkley]

Barkley, your stories always put a smile on my face that is just plain rude and I would have had a very hard time being civil to this person on the telephone!

thanks.

we did'nt have to deal with the parent on the phone because some of the first people called were so outraged they began passing the word on to everyone else they knew that had'nt attended, who passed the word on to others and so on and so on...so by the time the parent called us we were ready to answer their opening line of "what plans do you have for next sunday afternoon" with what had become the battle cry of the allerted masses "i have plans that can't be changed"

 

[golfgal]

I would start by calling the store back and asking if these gifts were mailed by the store or just bought in the store (if they can tell--keep in mind someone might buy something off a registry at another store and let the store with the registry know that) and WHO bought them. If they were purchased by the couples that didn't have gifts, I would call them and let them know that the store said they shipped those gifts and they were not received.

If you can't confirm who bought them or not and you see your friends often enough just in casual conversation about the wedding say "Jim and Julie were writing out thank yous the other day and found that several gifts purchased from their registry never arrived. I sure hope the people that sent them know that" or something like that.

 

[sturdypeasantstock]

with the other posters, please do not contact the guests and ask where the gift is. Times are hard for a lot of people, and just maybe those guests could not afford a gift!! I did have a bride, I barely knew call me and "Thank me" for a gift, I thought it was strange as I did not send her one and told her so! She then replied that she thought that maybe it had gotten lost in the mail, what nerve! No, I did not attend the wedding and I did decline on the RSVP, so she was clearly fishing for gifts. To be snarky, I did send her a used book on etiquette. Congratulations to the happy couple

Why did you decline the invitation? Why didn't you send a gift?