Bridal seamstress ruined wedding dress

hotsista24

Hi everyone

I hope someone can give me some advice on an urgent matter. My best friend is getting married on Friday and we just picked her dress up today from the bridal shop. They have completely messed up her alterations and we had to take it to a different seamstress to get it fixed. The bridal shop charged her £100 to alter the dress. The workmanship is completely disgusting and the new seamstress is shocked! How do we go about getting our money back? I am going to ring the bridal shop in the morning so any advice on what to say would be appreciated.

Oh and there is a lipstick mark on the dress which wasn't there before their seamstress started the alterations. Apparently we have to pay to get it cleaned ourselves!:mad::mad::mad:

sporedude

How do you know it was the seamstress? I've got advice for you, I just think your trying it on.

Pollycat

Didn't your friend try the dress on when she picked it up?
Surely she didn't just lay it over her arm and go out of the shop.

If the workmanship was so bad, surely it would have been noticeable then - which would have been the ideal time to complain.

You say you're going to speak to the shop today but you also say that

Apparently we have to pay to get it cleaned ourselves

so who told you that the responsibility for cleaning was yours?

pinkshoes

Why did she not try it on in the bridal shop, then when she noticed it was wrong, give the bridal shop the chance to put it right? Or was it agreed with the bridal shop that she would take it elsewhere?

She would be looking at small claims court to get her money back. She needs to speak to the bridal shop and ask them to refund her £100 as well as pay for cleaning. If they refuse, then she needs to send a recorded delivery letter giving them 14 days to pay the £100 and cleaning costs other wise she'll be taking them to the small claims court (letter before action). If they don't pay in 14 days, THEN she can start small claims court procedure, which can be done online.

Pollycat

I can't help but think that we have not been given the whole story here.

Meepster

Pollycat wrote: »

I can't help but think that we have not been given the whole story here.

Exactly what I was thinking...

yummymummy79

From the info given, you're going to struggle to get money back from the original seamstress if you didn't give her an opportunity to put the work right before going elsewhere. You can certainly try and write asking for the extra costs back but it just may not be as straightforward as you're hoping for. I guess timescale is an issue so you could put that as a reason for having to do it the other way round.

shellsuit

Surely when you noticed, you went back to the shop to complain and show them what you were complaining about before you went to another seamstress??

If not, why not?! You can't prove anything now as it's been taken away from the premesis and handed to someone else.

NEH

yummymummy79 wrote: »

From the info given, you're going to struggle to get money back from the original seamstress if you didn't give her an opportunity to put the work right before going elsewhere. You can certainly try and write asking for the extra costs back but it just may not be as straightforward as you're hoping for. I guess timescale is an issue so you could put that as a reason for having to do it the other way round.

I am in a certain simliar situation and didn't realise how bad the damage was when I left the shop until an independent tailors looked at it as sometimes the damage is very hard to see...You don't have to give the seamstress an opportunity to fix it as you can claim that you have lost complete confidence in her ability to rectify it, trading standard words not mine....

Firstly call your CAB or your local trading standards....and don't get any work done done to the dress as that would render your claim nul en void, speak to them first....they'll advise you what to do next..

yummymummy79

I suppose, but ideally there would at least be some agreement that you were going elsewhere to get it rectified, rather than just doing it behind their back and expecting it will be OK to claim the money back with them not knowing what's going on.

NEH

yummymummy79 wrote: »

I suppose, but ideally there would at least be some agreement that you were going elsewhere to get it rectified, rather than just doing it behind their back and expecting it will be OK to claim the money back with them not knowing what's going on.

Sorry should have explained more clearly...

the correct procedure is detail what is wrong with the dress and go and show them and then say you have no confidence in their ability to fix things..

but it is always necessary to ring trading standards or the CAB first...