How to write an event planner invoice

What goes on an event planner invoice

Six things, in the order they belong on the page. The invoice generator opens an event planner document with the lines already in place, so most of this is checking rather than typing.

1. Separate your fee from vendor costs. Florists, caterers and rentals are the client money passing through you. Never on the same line as your coordination fee.
2. Put the event date and venue on it. It is how both of you find the invoice again, and how a venue or a parent matches a payment.
3. Bill the planning fee and the day separately. Coordination over months and management on the day are different work with different risk.
4. Set a deposit schedule against the date. Money at booking, at a milestone, and before the event. Not one invoice afterwards.
5. State the cancellation and postponement terms. Postponement is the common case in events and the one most agreements forget.
6. Say what is not included. Overtime, extra guests, additional vendors. Events grow, and what is unpriced is assumed to be covered.

The lines an event planner invoice usually carries

The generator opens with these lines when you pick Event planner. The figures are placeholders to type over, not a going rate.

Add, rename, reorder or delete any line, and set tax per line where it applies. Priced as they open, that comes to $3,700 before tax.

How to write an event planner invoice, step by step

1. Lead with the event date and venue. Open the event planner invoice and put the date and the venue at the top. Every payment in an event schedule is tied to that date.
2. Separate planning from the day. The planning and coordination fee covers the weeks before; on-the-day management covers the day. Two lines, because clients value them differently.
3. Keep vendor money off your fee. Vendor sourcing is your work and goes on as a fee. The caterer's and florist's invoices are paid by the client or passed through at cost on their own lines.
4. Add styling and rentals. Decor rented in for the event, delivered and collected, is one line with what was supplied.
5. Show payments already made, then send. List the deposit and interim payments as minus lines, with dates. Set 7 days and have the balance due before the event, not after.

Event planner invoice example, filled in

The balance invoice for a wedding, sent before the day. Planning, on-the-day management, vendor sourcing and styling each have a line, and the note says which vendors the couple is paying directly.

Subtotal $3,700, tax $370, total $4,070. Vendor sourcing at $600 is your fee for finding and managing suppliers, and the note makes clear the suppliers themselves are paid separately. Earlier deposits go in as minus lines, so the couple sees the balance and nothing else.

Deposits staged against the date, not the work

Event planning is unusual in that your exposure is highest before anything visible has happened. Months of sourcing and coordination can precede a single deliverable, and a single invoice at the end puts all of it on one payment.

Stage it against the calendar: a booking deposit that secures your time, a payment at a milestone such as vendor confirmation, and the balance before the event rather than after it. Collecting the final payment after the event is how planners end up chasing people who have already had the day they were paying for.

Where vendors need paying before the event, your schedule has to sit ahead of theirs. A planner funding a caterer out of their own account because the client payment lands late is carrying a risk they were never paid to carry.

Vendor costs, and money that is passing through you

If you book vendors on the client behalf, that money is not yours. Mixing it with your fee makes your fee look enormous and makes the vendor cost look padded.

Show each vendor cost at cost on its own line, and your fee separately, whether that is a flat coordination fee or a percentage. If you take a percentage on vendor spend, show the percentage and the base.

Decide too whether the client pays vendors directly or through you, and put it on the invoice. Both arrangements work; what does not work is the client assuming one while you are operating the other.

Cancellation, postponement and the date that moves

Events get postponed far more often than they get canceled, and most agreements only cover cancellation.

Write both. What is retained on cancellation at different distances from the date, and what happens if the date moves: whether the deposit transfers, whether it transfers only within a window, and whether a rescheduling fee applies. Your time has already been spent either way.

Vendor terms flow through this too. If your caterer keeps a deposit on a postponement, the client needs to know that before it happens, which means it belongs on the document at booking rather than in a phone call afterwards.

Hourly, fixed price or per unit: how event planners price the work

Event planning is priced as a coordination fee, a percentage of budget, or a package, and the perennial problem is the same in all three: the client cannot tell your fee apart from the money that passes through you to venues, caterers and suppliers.

Separate your fee from vendor pass-through on every invoice, with each supplier named. It protects the perceived value of your work and it gives the client a document they can reconcile against their own budget, which is what they are doing at eleven at night in the month before.

Working out what to charge

Planning fees depend on the event size, the date and how much of the day you run, so a figure from a web page means little. The service price calculator builds a fee from your own planning hours, and the profit margin calculator checks what is left once rentals are paid.

Getting paid once it is sent

Stage the payments against the date: a deposit to book, an interim payment a few months out, and the balance due before the event, never after it. If the due date passes, the late fee calculator works out what your terms allow and the due date calculator sets the new date.

Five dates decide whether an event planner gets paid on time, and four of them are set before the work starts.

Mistakes that cost event planners money

• Vendor costs on your fee line. Your fee looks enormous and the vendor cost looks padded. Split them.
• One invoice after the event. You are chasing someone who has already had the day they were paying for.
• No postponement terms. Postponement is the common case and the one most agreements forget.
• Funding vendors from your own account. Carrying a cash risk nobody paid you to carry.
• Overtime unpriced. Events run long. What is unpriced is assumed to be included.

Event planner invoice questions

Free event planner invoice template

The free event planner invoice template opens with the lines above already priced, in any of 40 designs made for the trade, and exports a print-ready PDF with nothing saved to a server. Opening a design needs a free account.

Invoicing guides for related trades

Everything on this site, set up for event planners

The whole toolkit, with the reason each one matters to event planners rather than in general. The four marked links open with event planner already selected.