'My wedding planner cancelled on me six days before my big day'

Sandie Chivers, who runs Style and Joy Events, based in Fakenham, is now in correspondence with at least 18 couples to whom she owes refunds, after winding up her poorly-reviewed business unexpectedly last month.

Chivers, 30, who was the subject of reports earlier this year when complaints first emerged, told this paper she is suffering from a tumour and will make good on her debts.

However, bride Megan Greenaway has asked how her final £10,000 payment, made in late March, was unavailable to be refunded when the wedding was cancelled in mid-April. She says she has received no clear answers.

Megan, 28, was stunned when she and her husband-to-be Jordan, 26, received the bombshell news late one evening last month, less than a week before their big day.

The email referenced Chivers' health and said the business was closing. It included a form to apply for a refund but made no reference to Megan’s wedding.

Megan said: “We’d paid her for the marquee, the generator, toilets, tables, chairs, cutlery, crockery, tablecloths, napkins, you name it.

“She was supposed to be providing the photo booth, the dance floor, and welcome signs.

“She said she worked closely with a florist for a good deal, so the price included florals too, and she said her sister is a chef and she’s part of the family business and she would be cooking the three-course wedding breakfast.”

Megan paid a deposit in December 2020, when the company was called Mason Great Event Co, paid the final payment in March 2022, and exchanged dozens of emails with Chivers in between.

Megan said: “Every few months I’d send her ideas, Pinterest boards, and so on.

“We’d arranged for a meeting for her to come down - we live near Henley - and there were two or three occasions when she cancelled, saying she had Covid. We started to get worried.

Megan Oakey and Jordan Greenaway met through Young Farmers. He proposed in December 2020 and they paid a deposit to Style & Joy in January 2021 (Image: Supplied)

“At one point I asked her, if you’re going to mess us around let’s just cancel, because at the end of the day it’s my wedding, and she said 'no, no, everything is fine'.”

“Even up til three weeks before the wedding I was sending stuff. I’d confirmed the final menu choices, ordered high chairs, and she’d said ‘fine no problems’, then the Sunday before the wedding I got that email at twenty to ten at night.”

The couple, who are both farmers, were stunned.

“We both sat there in complete disbelief and then the shock hit.

“I said to Jordan, ‘we’re getting married in five days, what on earth are we going to do?’”

Somehow the couple, who met through Young Farmers, managed to salvage their wedding with enormous help from friends, family, and some contractors.

The reception was held at a friend's farm just outside Henley-on-Thames - where it was originally due to be held - and a local marquee company helped the pair ring round wedding suppliers and source the bare bones needed to entertain 90 guests, on a few days’ notice.

The couple managed to rescue their big day but still have not received a full refund from Chivers (Image: Supplied)

“They were amazing, so were our friends, and in the end we had a beautiful day of course,” said Megan, “but it was such a horrible stressful week and we still haven’t had our money back or any real explanation.”

Nine of Style and Joy's last ten reviews online have given the company a one-star rating on Google, with reviewers writing of poor service, last-minute let-downs, and missing refunds.

Ms Chivers issued the Greenaways a £2,000 refund five weeks ago. Speaking to the EDP on Thursday she said she had every right to wind up her company and promised everyone would receive full refunds.

She said: “I’ve closed the business. That’s in line with the law. After the trolling I received after the last article I had no choice but to close my business.”

She said she was selling inventory from her events business in order to issue refunds, stressing the wedding dress shop in Fakenham, of which she is a director, is “nothing to do with” her wedding planning business.

When she opened the shop she told the EDP it was an expansion of her events company.

Chivers did not say what had happened to £10,000 the Greenways paid her in late March, or why their money was no longer in the Style and Joy Events business account to be refunded.

If you are owed money after doing business with Sandie Chivers or Lee Mason of Style & Joy Events please contact Joel Adams at joel.adams@archant.co.uk.