RSVP

I know that in today’s society we have gotten casual with our manners.  No place is this more evident than our responding to invitations ,or rather I should say not responding to invitations. For some reason, we have gotten very lax with our social responsibilities with regard to replying to invitations.   I remember the summer I married.  The invitations were selected, engraved, and then sent out about six weeks before the wedding date.   At that time, and yes, I’m showing my age, there was no enclosed card to send back announcing your acceptance or regrets to the wedding.  As soon as my mother received the acceptances or regrets that were hand written, she marked her list and kept the number of acceptances for the caterer.  It was unheard of at that time to not respond to an invitation much less to a formal invitation.  This would have been unthinkable and considered rude.

During my teenage years, I was taught how to respond to invitations.  I can recall many handwritten notes that I sent to respond to formal invitations.  That was just something one knew how to do.  There were and still are reasons that one should respond to an invitation.  The first is common courtesy.  If someone thinks enough of you to extend an invitation, you owe them the courtesy of replying.  Today most formal invitations arrive with a card for you to send back stating your acceptance or regrets.  This has made it very easy for you to reply.  So there is really no excuse for not answering the invitation.  Another reason for responding to an invitation is the host/hostess really needs to know if you are attending in order to plan on the amount of food and drink that will be served.

I’m sure you all have had varied experiences with sending out invitations.  When my son and daughter-in-law married, they were in charge of their own wedding.  I know personally of some people who were on the guest list that never responded.  I know the recipients received their invitation, but obviously they didn’t feel the need to reply.  This was rude and not considerate on the recipient’s part.  Since the wedding was out of state, my son and his fiancee knew that the person probably wasn’t coming.  So they didn’t add their name to the dinner list. Their situation ended up well since they didn’t count the unanswered invitations in the count for the caterer.   My neighbor’s situation didn’t end as well.  When her daughter married, they didn’t hear from several people.  This was an in-town wedding.  So they didn’t know whether the guests were coming and just didn’t respond or whether they thought they didn’t have to respond since they weren’t planning on attending.  My friend also had several people accept, and then they didn’t show.  They didn’t call, write, or contact my friend at all.  I know we all have emergencies from time to time.  Even so, it is the polite thing to contact your host/hostess if you have an emergency and can’t make the affair.  My friend included the first people mentioned in her list for the caterer.  She was worried that the guests might show so she had to make sure there was a place for them at the seated dinner.  In the second case, the names had been included since the guests accepted ,and their names were added to the caterer’s head count.  My friend was charged for these guests that didn’t show but had accepted.  This cost them several hundred dollars.  This really shows a lack of good manners and no consideration for the person who was gracious to send the invitation.

So when do you respond?  Always.  RSVP comes from the French language.  It means repondez s’il vous plait.  If you receive an invitation with RSVP on it, you must reply.  If RSVP is on the invitation and there is no other note and there is no reply card, then you are to send a hand written note either accepting or regretting the invitation.

Some invitations will say “Please reply” or “The favor of a reply is requested”.  This instructs you to do exactly what it says.  However, other invitations may say “Regrets only”, and you only reply if you are unable to attend the function.  It doesn’t take much of your time to respond to an invitation.  This is an easy rule of etiquette to put into practice and one that people should make an effort to bring back as part of everyday life.

Questions or comments are always appreciated.

The Etiquette School of Northeast Georgia
Hoschton, Georgia (Hamilton Mill area, Dacula, GA)
Email Ginny Brown
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