x-post from liw...thinking about taking legal action against my photographer...please help!

Girls this is going to be a long one but please get thru it and PLEASE HELP ME!!
Background...booked our photographer/videographer in May 2008 after interviewing 11 others. Felt very comfortable after speaking with the owner who was the photographer. Booked with him as our day of photographer. About a week before the wedding, DH and i dropped off everything for the video (songs on cd, pics for baby montage, etc). Only thing we didnt drop off were honeymoon pics for obvious reasons. At that point we were going over everything for the day of our wedding and they said "and Jim (name has been changed) will see you at 12:30" so i reply no we didnt book with Jim we booked Harold (once again wrong name). They told us that they had to switch the photographer because Harold had a previous engagement. I was livid but they pacified me and told me Jim is fantastic, etc. Day of comes...Jim arrives on time takes pics of me and girls. The pics for the most part are terrible. He took one of me and each bm, fg, etc outside and every pic we are squinty. He then says he has to leave (its now 115) to take pics of the groom, i say ummm okay. he leaves. HE never took pics of dh...our other photographer was there taking pics of him. So where was he for an hour??? Any how. I had one pic of my mom and me and one pic of my parents and me...both horrible...neither in my album. I was supposed to get my proofs 12 weeks later....girls as u know it was almost 2 months after that!!!! Plus no pics of DH dancing with his mother....they sent them to us finally weeks later. I end up making my own thank you cards because the card they designed was a joke. They tell me i will get something in exchange for doing my own cards. Fast forward to today...i go in to do album layouts.
Photographer never took pic of my invite...i am told to go home and do this and send it in if i want it in my album. I ask if they can add flower petals to a pic (coming out of church flowers are in the air all on one side) i am told to do it and send it in...that that would be extra graphic editing...ummm on one pic??? I was also told my video would be done today...i get there and he says no way you gave us your honeymoon pics in january (totally forgot that is my fault) but now it will be at least another 9 months til i get my video cause they did nothing without those honeymoon pics. The day of the wedding they gave out cards on the tables to view the pics online. They had the wrong bride and grooms names on it....found out 3 months later when the pics were finally posted....i went to see our pics and it was another couple---their wedding was gorgeous may i add. So today he gives us the correct cards and tells us our pics are no longer online but if we would like them to be back online, we can pay $10 per month to have them posted. So let me get this straight...u guys screw up and we have to pay to have them posted plus to mail the cards out to guests????? He missed more than half of our must take list. Oh and even though we paid overtime because our day was long, at the beginning of the dessert hour the photographers asked to leave. I of course said no but still. And the kicker today...i ask what they are doing for us being we made our own thank you cards and we never had our engagement shoot done (photographer would only do them on thurs and neither dh nor i could get off on a thursday) and he says "oh those were both complimentary....they have no monetary value." Keep in mind we paid over $9,000 for our photo/video....not sure if it matters but i we should have had much better service. Please help...any advice?!??!?!?!?

Re: x-post from liw...thinking about taking legal action against my photographer...please help!

I don't think you can take legal action for this. You can report him to the BBB, but you can't take legal action for not being satified with a product like that.

I'm not a lawyer, but I'm not sure what you could pursue.

Re: x-post from liw...thinking about taking legal action against my photographer...please help!

my thing is i dont want a refund of anything like that...i simply want to be refunded for the services he did not provide such as the thank you cards, and the issue with putting the pics online.

Re: x-post from liw...thinking about taking legal action against my photographer...please help!

Re: x-post from liw...thinking about taking legal action against my photographer...please help!

the thank you cards are....as well as the fact they would be posted for 3 months from date of posting online but the thing is they gave the wrong cards...they wanted me to mail out my the little card with their names (paying for stamps, etc) and paying the $10 a month online so they can get more $$ off of the prints. I think that's just bad business.

Re: x-post from liw...thinking about taking legal action against my photographer...please help!

I would think the fact that your TYs are stated in the contract you should be able to get something for that.

I'm not sure about the online thing only b/c they could argue why didn't you contact them sooner?

I do think it's in poor form to not just offer you the service but there may not be any kind of recourse you can take.

Good luck, I hope things work out for you!!!

Re: x-post from liw...thinking about taking legal action against my photographer...please help!

when i spoke to them about the thank yous and we said i would do my own and they would reimburse me in some way they said they were sending me the correct cards so i could send them out with my thank yous. I told them what day i was sending them out and they said i would have them before them. Didnt get them. Didnt maill out the thank yous. Asked them where the cards were. They said they were on their way. Never got them. Sent out thank yous and they never got back to me. It's more annoying than anything lol

Re: x-post from liw...thinking about taking legal action against my photographer...please help!

I would write a legalish sounding letter regarding the online stuff, etc.

What does your contract say regarding the photographer? Did they have the right to switch in the contract?