Lay out each couple’s instalment schedule and payment reminders, with a reference line family members can copy

Venues take money over a long time: Sonas, a venue software vendor, reports that deposits often land 12 to 18 months before the wedding. In a GoCardless case study, the head of IT at Cripps & Co, a UK wedding venue group, says that family members often pay on behalf of the couple without using the invoice reference, and that matching those payments was a manual nightmare; GoCardless reports that it took venue managers and accounts around 14 hours a week per venue, and that automating it saved about £2,000 a month per venue in salaries. Whatever payment system you use, a clear schedule and reminders help: each message carries the exact payment reference and asks anyone paying for the couple to use it. The AI lays out the schedule and drafts the reminders from blanks. It never sees a name, an amount or a bank detail, and it does no maths. Whoever keeps your accounts sets the dates and amounts from the signed contract and checks each reminder, and any deposit, refund or cancellation question goes to your contract and, if needed, your solicitor.

An AI chat tool you already use

Steps

1. In your own system, set each booking’s instalment dates and amounts from the signed contract. Keep amounts and bank details there, never in the AI tool.
2. Decide your payment reference format (for example booking number and wedding date) and how anyone paying for the couple should use it.
3. Run the prompt below with its brackets left as they are. You get back a schedule layout, a reminder before each due date, a polite overdue note and a short note for family members who are paying.
4. Fill in the blanks in your own system for each booking, and have whoever keeps the accounts check each date and reference against the contract.
5. Send reminders from your own email or payment tool. If a payment arrives without a reference, ask the couple before matching it, rather than guessing.
6. For any question about deposits, refunds, postponement or cancellation, read your own contract and, if it is unclear, ask your solicitor before you reply.

The exact prompt

Write four things for [VENUE NAME], an independent wedding venue in the UK.
1. A blank instalment schedule table with columns: instalment number, due date ([DATE]), amount ([AMOUNT, FROM THE CONTRACT]), payment reference ([REFERENCE]), paid on, checked by ([ROLE]). Leave ten rows with every cell as a bracket or empty.
2. A reminder of under 80 words sent [DAYS BEFORE, CHOSEN BY THE VENUE] before each due date: instalment [NUMBER] is due on [DATE]; please pay by [PAYMENT METHOD] using the reference [REFERENCE] exactly.
3. A polite overdue note of under 80 words sent on [DATE]: the instalment due on [DATE] has not been received or could not be matched; please check and use the reference [REFERENCE]; questions to [CONTACT ROLE].
4. A short note of under 60 words the couple can forward to anyone paying for them, explaining that the reference [REFERENCE] must be used so the payment reaches their booking.
Do not mention any amount except the bracket, any penalty, interest, refund or cancellation term, and do not do any arithmetic.
RULES FOR THIS CHAT: I will give you only my own venue wording, headings, dates and published prices that I have typed in. I will not give you, and you must not ask for, any couple’s, guest’s or family member’s name, email address, phone number or address, any payment, card or bank detail, any amount a named couple owes, or the text of any signed contract. Use the blanks in square brackets exactly as I give them. Do not invent dates, prices, inclusions, availability, terms or facts about any person, supplier, council or registrar, and do not say what is standard, usual, fair, owed, allowed or legal. Do not give legal, consumer-law, licensing, safety, tax or accounting advice, and do not do any arithmetic: copy every figure exactly as I typed it or leave the cell empty. Where something is missing write [FOR THE VENUE TO COMPLETE]. Everything you write is a draft that a named person will check before anything is sent.