just wanted to take a minute to rant about how people treat video crews. probably other service people as well. most of y’all reading this probably won’t ever run an event that you’d even need to think of this…but perhaps you have a spouse or family member that you can pass the word along to. or maybe you will have a wedding sometime in the future.
can i just say how annoying it is how often people who hire others to do work for them, like video taping an event, forget all about the needs of those people??? being paid in a timely fashion is one biggie. video people have families to support too, ya know! and they are being kept away from their families to help you capture your special occasion only because of that money they are promised, so PLEASE pay them in a timely fashion!! its truly ridiculous how often people don’t pay my husband immediately or even shortly after the job he’s done for them!! sometimes its no big deal because it was just a small oversight, and he’s really a nice guy and isn’t going to make a big stink about things like you forgetting to bring your checkbook (like was the case last night after my husband, father-in-law, sister-in-law, brother-in-law and a friend didn’t get paid after working 2 straight 7 hour days of shooting live to the web at this pre-oscars celebrity gift suite party in hollywood.) ok, mistakes happen…but now here we have 5 people who had planned to leave this morning to drive the 4+ hours to return to their families (and yes, they all have families waiting anxiously to see them after being apart from them for 3 days), that are stuck in southern california, waiting for this chick to return their call. apparently she partied pretty hard last night. SIGH. this is just so friggin rude and unprofessional! and none of those 5 people can do anything about it. they are stuck, or they might not get paid for all their work!! because, who’s to say that she’ll mail them a check if they leave? they don’t know her from boo, so why would they trust that she would do that? UGH UGH UGH.
and while i’m ranting…another issue that is a biggie: FEED THE PEOPLE YOU HIRE!! if you have someone that is working a full day without break, you really need to feed them. its not fair to expect them to fend for themselves. and if you promise to feed them, don’t feed them crap!! i cannot tell you how many times my husband has worked at an event where he was never promised food (and never gets a break and can’t go anywhere to find food), or was promised food and doesn’t get any…OR, they give him some crap that they scraped together in the back kitchen somewhere when all the guests he’s shooting are eating the prime rib and other yummy things. talk about discrimination! so the camera crew, who busts their asses to document your event in a high quality manner don’t deserve to eat as well as your guests? why IS that, please tell me?? its like they are being treated as lowly servants and are not worthy of even remembering or taking care of properly.
sorry, i’m just really pissed over this whole thing right now. i know adam is a nice guy and would never complain about these sorts of things…and people you hire probably won’t either. but please think if that was your husband who was being kept away from you and your children for hours at a time, and no one even thought he was important enough to FEED??
and i won’t even go into people who just drag out things far beyond when they said they would last. adam frequently ends up working HOURS over when he was supposed to be able to return to his family, simply because the people running the event are not organized nor considerate enough to keep things to the schedule that they said they would! grrrrrr and sometimes he gets paid extra for it, but sometimes he does not.
now, in defense of some brides/grooms/hosts…there certainly are times when they DO think of them…and adam has at times been saved a seat to eat with the guests. and that’s marvelous. but more often then not, no one thinks about him even if they promised him to eat…OR he’s forced to eat some crap back in the kitchen!! seriously pisses me off when i hear of these things! and his children are crying at home for their daddy because they miss him dreadfully, and he’s not being fed and not being paid timely…all because we need the money and he’s busting his ass to provide for his family and the damn hosts of the event don’t think he is important enough to remember!!
ok, i’ve ranted enough. i would ask that you just think about this the next time you hire someone to work an event for you. and now that i’m thinking about it…i am going to make sure that we remember our DJ at our upcoming Discovery Center event because i’m afraid that i may have forgotten them in the past and have to kick myself for that and fix it in the future. see, even i forget. so i needed this reminder too! 🙂
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