Wedding Car Hire

The choice of wedding cars is usually listed as one of the key components of any wedding plan. There certainly is no shortage of choice nowadays of anything from old double-decker London buses to stretch Hummer 4WDs that look like giant breeze blocks on wheels.

If you're happy to go along with modern limos and cars you're pretty safe, especially if you use a reputable company that, preferably, has been recommended to you by someone you trust.

Many companies offer vintage and other lovely old cars as wedding transport and, frankly, I can't think of anything more romantic than being driven around in a 1935 Bentley with real wood, real leather and all of the Agatha Christie style and panache. However once again reality rears its ugly head. Old cars can break down.

If you hire one of these companies, ensure they provide you with one or even two contingency plans - i.e. if that Bentley conks out on the day, what will they replace it with? If they give you a fuzzy answer, use somebody else. Especially if your wedding is scheduled for a popular month, the company concerned might be tempted by greed and hire out all their vehicles to different weddings on the same day. If one vehicle goes sick, they're stuck. A bigger company probably will have found this one out the hard way earlier on, and is more likely to have appropriate back-up.

Relatives' and friends' own

If someone you know has a nice car and offers to drive you to and from your wedding in it, you'll certainly save some money. However bear in mind that no matter how well intentioned people are, things can still go wrong. If nothing else, you will sleep better in your bed at night knowing that there is a contingency plan in place - even if it is your Mum's hatchback with some white ribbon on it.

Stretch limos

Most stretch limos are what the motor trade unromantically calls 'cut and shut' vehicles - an ordinary car, van or SUV that has been chopped in half vertically, extra panelling installed to extend it, then all welded up again. Provided that this has been done properly there's no problem, but some 'cut and shut' vehicles have been done on the cheap to an alarmingly poor standard. At best this can make the vehicle unreliable (e.g. the electrics may have been wired back up wrongly) and at worst it can make it downright dangerous.