Wedding Gift

[up-country_sinclair]

A colleague is getting married, and I am wondering how much to put in the envelope. We're not particularly close, but I do see him around the office a couple of times per week.

Several years ago I believe it was acceptable to put 300 - 500 baht in the envelope, but I'm wondering if that has changed at all due to inflation or other factors.

Thanks.

[Kwasaki]

How Much emm !!!! Depends how close you want to get.

[onnut]

are you married? let your wife deal with it.

if not I would go 1000 baht, cant go wrong with that really.

[JurgenG]

Are you invited to the wedding ? If you are not, just colleague, 500 should be enough. If you're invited, even if you're not going, 1,000 would be more in the norm.

[davidabraham]

I new in this forum. but there is interesting topic which you shared. There are many things to special gift for wedding. there have no prize to be watch.

David

[highlander76]

Are you invited to the wedding if you are I would say 1000baht if you are not invited to the wedding 500baht should be alright

[chickenslegs]

Seems to me that, from the point of view of the 'happy couple' the object of the exercise is to recoup the wedding expenses.

What I always do is estimate our share of the cost of the meal, drinks, entertainment, etc. and contribute accordingly.

The last wedding we attended was a hotel 'do' far from home and the family had arranged (and paid for) two hotel rooms for the four of us. The party was fabulous and the food/drink unlimited.

I put quite a few thousand Baht in our envelope.

On another occasion, when the wedding was closer to home and less lavish, the contribution (from the four of us) was 4,000 Baht. 1,000 per person seems to be a respectable figure.

If it's just an office 'whip round' and you won't be partying at the family's expense, I'd say 500 Baht is a generous gift.

Of course, if it's close friends or close family the gift should be calculated according to the needs of the couple and your financial means.

Just my 2 Satang's worth.

[Loz]

Chickinlikin says it all.

My advice:

If your already thinking about the cost, don't go and give him up to 500bht in the rsvp. As stated, that is quite generous for declining an invitation which you didn't fully comprehend.

[phutoie2]

If you are married leave it up to the TW, she will know, otherwise have a butchers at what whisky & tucker is on offer!.

Decent stuff all ok, a few months ago an old Aussie married in our town and 2 warm bottles of chang and pop on the table.

I am still in shock!

[chickenslegs]

If you are married leave it up to the TW, she will know, otherwise have a butchers at what whisky & tucker is on offer!.

Decent stuff all ok, a few months ago an old Aussie married in our town and 2 warm bottles of chang and pop on the table.

I am still in shock!

If I left it up to my TW there'd never be more than 500 Baht in the envelope.

I have to think about my 'face'.

BTW - I can't believe an Aussie put 2 bottles of Chang and pop on your table. He must have been at least half English (I was going to say Scots, but my PC training kicked in).

[Beetlejuice]

Perhaps this will help. What my girlfriend and I usually give on these occasions:

Not invited:

Neighbours – 300 baht.

Acquaintances: 300 baht

Friends: 500 baht

Family – 500 baht

Invited:

Neighbours – 500 baht.

Acquaintances: 500 baht

Friends: 1000 baht

Family – 1000 baht

This all depends on what kind of do is being laided on. For example if we are invited and it`s just a normal house affair I would give the above, but if one of those high flung DOs in a posh hotel, I would probably give a lot more, perhaps 2000 or 3000 baht. And if we were to bring more people with us, children, friends and so on, we would give accordingly.

[BSJ]

If you are married leave it up to the TW, she will know, otherwise have a butchers at what whisky & tucker is on offer!.

Decent stuff all ok, a few months ago an old Aussie married in our town and 2 warm bottles of chang and pop on the table.

I am still in shock!

If I left it up to my TW there'd never be more than 500 Baht in the envelope.

I have to think about my 'face'.

BTW - I can't believe an Aussie put 2 bottles of Chang and pop on your table. He must have been at least half English (I was going to say Scots, but my PC training kicked in).

No mate, there are some miserable bar-steads here in Oz! Not many, but enough to be talked about.

[johna]

Thais keep a book recording how much each person gives and this will be consulted when you invite them to some similar event, so you will get back what you give with interest.

I have been giving money to these events for years, hopefully I will recoup some of this at my funeral.

If the guys not close 500 is enough

[Heng]

Look at the location as well. Wedding in a rice paddy or 5 star hotel? Just you and a date or you and your whole family (your contribution may be seen as divided by the number of stomachs you bring; because that's how the hosts are paying for the event).

[Spee]

Traditional American wedding protocol says you give approximately what it cost for the bride and groom to provide for you at the wedding. For example, a couple with two plates @ $50 per plate and perhaps $25 each at the bar, would equate to roughly $150 which you may want to round up to $200 for close family or down to $100 for not so close work colleague.

YMMV but probably shouldn't be too far off for Thailand either. Simple ceremony and party in the moo bahn, perhaps a few hundred baht as others have suggested. Lavish ceremony and party at an upscale establishment with top shelf grub 'n hooch, maybe double or triple that amount or even add a zero.

[jonnyscot]

Perhaps this will help. What my girlfriend and I usually give on these occasions:

Not invited:

Neighbours – 300 baht.

Acquaintances: 300 baht

Friends: 500 baht

Family – 500 baht

Invited:

Neighbours – 500 baht.

Acquaintances: 500 baht

Friends: 1000 baht

Family – 1000 baht

This all depends on what kind of do is being laided on. For example if we are invited and it`s just a normal house affair I would give the above, but if one of those high flung DOs in a posh hotel, I would probably give a lot more, perhaps 2000 or 3000 baht. And if we were to bring more people with us, children, friends and so on, we would give accordingly.

Agree with the above,,, Wifes Brother Got Married 3 months back,, wife put 1000 into envelope from both of us, I told her she should consider putting in more, but she told me 1000 was more than enough, (house wedding)

[up-country_sinclair]

Thanks for the replies.

It's a house wedding which I was invited to, but I don't know him very well at all. I'm going to put 500 baht in the envelope.

[CWMcMurray]

The only thing I don't understand is people saying to give money if you were not invited to the wedding???

I am sure that there are hundreds of weddings happening every day in Thailand, but I would never give money to any of them unless I was invited to the wedding.

[Heng]

It's a hedge against future invitations in some cases. For example if you have 2 kids and they have 3 kids. If you attended or 'enveloped' 2 of their family weddings and they did the same for your family, it wouldn't be 'rude' not to attend or envelope the 3rd wedding in their family. You might attend anyway, but in situations where you aren't even close to their family and don't even really know the folks in question, you'd be able to give it a pass with no 'social' penalty.

It's all relative though. Some folks live by the rule of giving as little as possible and bringing as many guests as possible.

Edited November 16, 2010 by Heng

[bifftastic]

The only thing I don't understand is people saying to give money if you were not invited to the wedding???

I am sure that there are hundreds of weddings happening every day in Thailand, but I would never give money to any of them unless I was invited to the wedding.

I'm hereby not inviting any of you to my wedding. PM me for details of where you can send the money apart from you CW, you can come

[Berkshire]

The only thing I don't understand is people saying to give money if you were not invited to the wedding???

I am sure that there are hundreds of weddings happening every day in Thailand, but I would never give money to any of them unless I was invited to the wedding.

100% in agreement. Who in their right mind would give money to someone getting married if they weren't even invited? That's asinine. I can understand being invited and unable to attend, so give/send money/gift. But to hear about a freakin wedding where you're not even invited and just blindly hand over money? What planet are these people from?

[dave111223]

I find it strange that so many people are suggesting putting money "in the envelope" even if you aren't invited to the wedding.

If you weren't invited how would there be an "envelope" to begin with? Or are there people out there who actually give out empty envelopes to people that they don't want at the wedding, but they do want money from?

I would think the only case to give money if you weren't invited to a wedding would be if the person previously came to your wedding and did give you money.

[Heng]

edit: ah, yeah... what Dave said. Skipped over it.

An example situation where the 'not invited' but felt obliged to 'envelope' situation is a wedding where you chose not to invite some people for whatever reason (at my wedding for example to keep the guest count under a fixed number) but they still sent envelopes because I attended their wedding in the past. Thus they still felt obliged to send envelopes despite the invitation snub because of the greater need to balance the social 'books.'

Not everyone follows the same rules, and it's apparent a lot of folks here would prefer to be 'one up' and not send anything. All good.

Edited November 17, 2010 by Heng

[chickenslegs]

I find it strange that so many people are suggesting putting money "in the envelope" even if you aren't invited to the wedding.

If you weren't invited how would there be an "envelope" to begin with? Or are there people out there who actually give out empty envelopes to people that they don't want at the wedding, but they do want money from?

I would think the only case to give money if you weren't invited to a wedding would be if the person previously came to your wedding and did give you money.

Back in the UK I often contributed towards gifts for colleagues (weddings, births, retirement) without being invited to any party.

I've never worked in Thailand and never been asked to contribute anything without being invited to the 'do' - so I don't know whether the 'office whip-round' goes on here.

[johna]

My better half informs me that we have 4 invitations for Friday so that's a total of 2000฿ for one day.

We get about 20 invitations each year, but only close family get 500฿ or more.

For some family's these invitations must be a heavy financial burden.

[Bluetongue]

I'm a believer in the ha lawy, I think it goes back to when I first came here I'm not even sure they had a 1000 baht note. I certainly never saw one. 500 if its a wedding of a friendly local acquaintance or neighbour, haven't had a family one yet except mine and no-one gave more than 100 then or maybe someone gave 500 I'm not sure, we got about 3000 and didn't have a set piece meal or anything just beers and whiskies for a few friends and mostly family. I figure 500 is more than enough because I dont drink much at these functions as I usually have to drive and I like to keep my wits about me when socialising in the community, and the missus doesn't drink either.

Sometimes these envelope things are a bit too regular for my liking, and I've manged to talk the missus into only giving 200 into the envelope for most funerals or go to monk parties, I dont care if people think I'm a bit stingy might keep a few of the supplicants away and not create a precedent. There are lots of elderly folks around one day there could be a lot of funerals, might start another post about how much that will cost me if MIL dies.

[hhgz]

Lots of discussion over 500THB...