Why is my photographer charging me travel fees?

As a bride who is working with a limited budget your first instinct is to keep your budget in line. Any additional unexpected fees can send you into a tailspin. Such can be the case with destination fees that a wedding photographer may charge. I want to share with you what it looks like from the photographers end so that you understand what the fees are, why they are being charged and how to come to an agreement on them.

When a photographer books a destination wedding or something that is more than 2-3 hours away from their home base they charge for it. Sometimes these fees cover gas and food and sometimes there are also hotel and other incidentals. For a photographer, shooting = money, so if they are out of their studio they can’t book other shoots and therefore aren’t making any money. In your mind you just paid them a several thousand dollars to be there so you are paying them well. When you look at the fees for the wedding, you just have the shoot day in mind but that’s not really the case. On the front end they spent time meeting with you, following up, preparing contracts etc. but the real work is done after the wedding while you are enjoying your honeymoon. On the back end of a wedding which we will go into more detail in a later post  there can be anywhere from 20-40 hours of post-production spent on editing, processing from RAW to Jpeg, Photoshop work, album design, lab orders, packing, shipping etc…

As exciting as destination wedding can be for a photographer this is still a business and they still have to charge accordingly. You can read an in-depth post on Destination Weddings and associated fees in Rob’s article here…

Incidentals: Most photographers have a list of incidentals they feel they will incur while shooting your wedding. They can include Phone charges, WiFi,  gas, rental cars, food, taxis, snacks etc. This is probably the most negotiable area since its there is no concrete number associated with it. In most cases it’s not a big deal but if you are getting married at pricy resort miles from anything, be aware that it is not easy for your photographer to get out of the resort to eat cheap.

The Real 411: Agree on a price before hand and there will be no hidden surprises. Get an itemized list of what the fees are and for how many days. Get it in writing! But always consider this… the Photographer could always stay home and shoot  a wedding for the same money and still pick up extra work and not lose production time so it really is up to you to pay the fees and get the photographer you really want instead of hiring someone local who you will regret hiring later. Remember, you can’t undo bad wedding photography!