Credit Cards Can Be Your Friends

There’s nothing wrong with paying for your wedding expenses with a credit card – as long as you pay that card off in full at the end of the month.

There’s actually a lot of pluses for paying with a credit card: it’s quick, convenient, the preferred choice of many vendors and a great way to rack up bonus points such as Aeroplan miles.

But then are also some pretty big downsides, debt for example.

Thankfully, it’s easy to avoid debt: simply never put anything on you credit card until you have until cash in your bank account to cover that particular item. Then, as soon as the charge appears on your credit card statement, pay it off. This way your never incur any interest or late penalties.

Of course, the downside to this method is that you have to already have the money to cover the expense. This isn’t really a big deal if your purchase in question is a $100 pair of shoes but if the purchase is say, your $3200 venue deposit, this situation is a bit trickier.

Still, if you’re really having a common sense wedding, you should have saved up that cash first. This doesn’t mean that you have to have your entire budget in the bank first before you announce your date; it just means that you need to stay ahead of all your expenses and have to cover them as they come up. So if your venue is costing you $12,000, you don’t need that $12,000 in your account on the day you sign your contract with the venue, you just need enough to cover the deposit and then enough to cover each subsequent payment.

If family is contributing to your wedding fund, sit down with the contributors and find out exactly how much is being given, in what form and when so that you don’t end up carrying a bunch of expenses on your credit card while waiting for the funds.

While your parents giving you $5,000 is extremely generous, getting that cash somewhat early in the planning process is much more useful than getting it on the day of your wedding, after most of the bills have been paid. Alternatively, they could put that $5,000 directly towards one of your bigger costs, catering for example.