Complaint Review: Blu Couture Wedding Films - Irvine Nationwide

SUMMARY:

We hired Blu Couture Wedding Films to film our wedding in Miami on November 23rd 2013 and have paid them their entire fee.

To this day they have not delivered to us any wedding videos or any footage of our wedding. We are extremely upset and fear that this video, the only filmed recording of our wedding, might be lost forever.

To this day, Marty and Mandie have refused to refund us the money we paid them. 

DETAILS:

Blu Couture wedding films is owned and operated by a married couple: Marcin "Marty" Grusznis and Mandie Duplancich.

We hired them on July 15 2013 to come to Miami and film our wedding on Nov 23 2013

Our package with them included:

(1) 12 hours wedding day coverage

(1) Three cinematographers/ up to 4 cameras full HD

(1) Feature Film (cinematic edit up to 20 minutes)

(1) documentary of first look, ceremony, reception and a film teaser up to 4 minutes of bride and groom prep

(1) six (6) Blu-Ray w/ full menu options delivered in custom cases

(1) All travel cost are included

We paid them in 3 installments: 25% in July 2013-when we signed the contract, 50% in Nov 2013-3 weeks before the wedding and 25% in Dec 2013-one week after the wedding. They flew to Miami and filmed our wedding on Nov 23 2013. The wedding and filming went on without any problems.

Per our contract and from our conversations with them, we expected to receive the 4 minute film teaser around Jan 2014, and the full 20 minute movie 6 months after the wedding date, around May 2014. By Feb 2014 we had not received the teaser from them so we started contacting them on a regular basis (every couple of weeks or so) to get an estimated delivery date. They kept excusing themselves and promised they would deliver everything within the 6-month timeframe (by May 2014) By May 2014, we had not received anything from them yet, so we kept asking them every couple of weeks or so for the status of our video. They repeatedly replied that it would be ready soon.

On July 30th 2014, after we contacted them once again asking for the status of our video, they called us and let us know that they had been the victims of a break-in/burglary that occurred on July 1st 2014. They told us they were travelling for work and had rented a house. While they were away, someone broke into the house and stole all of their equipment (laptop, backup drive, cameras). They said our video was on a laptop which was stolen and backed up on a hard drive which was also stolen. They said that they did not back-up our video anywhere else, per their standard practice. Therefore, all the existing copies of our wedding video were on the stolen equipment and that they did not longer have any other copies of our video or any footage from our wedding.  We contacted the police department where the burglary occurred and were able to verify that the break-in had been reported to them and was being investigated. We kept in constant contact with that police department hoping that the stolen equipment would turn up eventually and we would be able to recover the video.

After a few weeks of waiting, the stolen equipment did not turn up so we gave up our hopes of recovering our video. During this waiting period, Blu Couture never offered to refund any of our money. On Sep 15 2014, we asked Blu Couture for the first time to refund our money and they told us they needed a few days to set up a payment plan. Since then, we have had to ask them numerous times for our refund and have gotten nothing from them except excuses and attempts to delay. To this day we have not received any refund and are still contacting them periodically, trying to get refunded.

Through the police department, we were able to contact 2 other couples that were in the same situation as us: Blu Couture claimed their videos as being stolen during the break-in and refused to refund them.

We do not recommend Blu Couture Wedding Films.