2a. Wedding Tips on choosing banquet venue

These are some stuff that I have compiled from the forums:

Things to look out for when considering a Banquet venue:

• Try to get a rough guest list ready when you're looking at venues. At the very least, bug, nag, harrass and use all possible means to get parents to give you a figure to work with. That way, you are less likely to end up with a venue that's too small or too big.
• High ceilings are important.
• Banquet halls should generally be a regular shape. Weird corners make it difficult for guests to see what's actually going on.
• If numbers/the venue permits, you may want to consider booking two banquet halls in one hotel. A friend did this earlier this year: he left the colleagues and relatives in the bigger banquet hall and had his rowdy friends in a smaller one. The bride and groom unfortunately had to do a bit of running about, but they (and their friends) enjoyed themselves more than if everyone had been packed into one big hall.
• Make sure that the hotel has a wedding planner/coordinator of sorts. Ask about the planner's credentials and work experience. The industry is unfortunately a competitive one and good planners tend to move / get poached by other hotels on a regular basis - hence you may have had a good experience with one planner and then found out closer to your wedding date that the person actually doing the work on the day itself is a different person. NOT good.

When negotiating a banquet package:

• It is important to do your research. When we negotiated the package for our wedding, the package did not include a barrel of beer on the house. However, we told the wedding planner that we knew of packages from other hotels which included this. She eventually agreed to let us have a barrel of beer on the house.
• Usually one barrel of beer is enough, unless you have friends/relatives who drink beer like water.
• Negotiate for a corkage waiver. At the very least, if you are not getting any alcohol from the hotel at all, the waiver should be around 1.5 bottles per table. Generally, if you commit to a larger number of tables, hotels are more willing to negotiate the corkage waiver. The corkage waiver should be for both wine and hard liquor (although I understand that less people consume the latter these days).
• This is not really related to the banquet package. But when you are considering what wines to get, reds generally go down better with most Singaporeans. I've found that usually a third of the wine consumed is white whilst the rest are reds. Note that reds are also easier to serve as they are good at room temperature. I find that most whites need to be chilled thoroughly before serving, hence it's harder to ensure that white wines are served at a proper temperature throughout dinner.
  
• If your wedding is a whole day affair (church/tea ceremony in the morning and afternoon, dinner in the evening), try to get a helpers' room included in your banquet package. Your friends will be running ragged the whole day to ensure that the day runs smoothly. They are unlikely to have the time to go home and rest during the day. At the same time, you don't really want everyone trudging in and out of your bridal suite. A helpers' room servers two purposes: it lets your friends have a time to rest, and at the same time, preserves the privacy of the bridal suite.
• Try asking for extra night of stay, extra complimentary barrel of beer, chair covers or increase the number of invitation cards and complimentary parking. This will usually work only if you book early. Or, you can change the items like anniversary dinner voucher to others.

A wedding package typically includes:

• Complimentary one or two nights stay in the hotel suite
• Complimentary bottle of champagne, fruit basket and breakfast for two
• Complimentary parking for up to 20% of confirmed attendance
• Complimentary barrel of beer
• Complimentary trial dinner for 6 or 10 people
• Complimentary fruit cake or chocolate pralines for all your invited guests
• Free flow of Chinese tea, soft drinks and mixes (not inclusive of juices)
• Wedding invitation cards with envelopes based on 60% or 70% of confirmed attendance (not inclusive of printing)

Selected list of hotels and rates (to be updated).
I have compared the 2007 package for Grand Copthrone, Merchant Court, Marina Mandarin, Fullerton and Pan Pacific. It includes:

• Contact information
• Capacity
  
• Nett Weekday/weekend rates
• Beverages (wine corkage)
• Food (e.g. outsourced to Crystal Jade, supplied by own kitchen etc)
  
• Other stuff included in the package (e.g. carpark, coupons, LCD projectors)
  

If it is urgent, you can email me for the excel. It is does not include all the hotels because I only studied these few shortlisted ones for my wedding. I had some others but they are the 2006 pricelist, so I removed them from the spreadsheet.

At the same time, do check out the banquet summary from SingaporeBrides. Do the first cut shortlist from this place.