The Pros Wedding Service, American Wedding Group Videography Review, Missing Video Footage, Horrible Service Huntingdon Valley ,Pennsylvania, Salem Massachusetts

This is an update to my previous review (Titled the Worst Experience). After publishing our review, The Pros contacted us and addressed the issue. They offered to review the photos and video again to see if they can be improved. They worked on our photos and make them more acceptable but of course nothing could be done about the video.

So, while The Pros tries to give you a good service, ultimately it all depends on the professionals you hire. I strongly suggest you choose your professionals carefully. Ask to see more samples of their work and talk to their previous clients. If their work is not good, there is nothing that The Pros can do about it.

I don’t know where to start. We just celebrated our first anniversary but even after a year from the wedding, I still feel like crying every time I see my photos and videos. Our whole experience with the Pros was terrible from beginning to end. I can even say it has been a traumatic experience for me.

We got our photographer and videographer from the Pros (Thank God we had our own DJ!). The first thing that hit us on the wedding day was how passive and uninterested the photographer and videographer were. They showed up with straight faces and very passive behavior at our door. Their behavior actually made us very uncomfortable throughout the night. They did not smile even once all night long!!! How can you show up at someone’s wedding and not smile even once! And I mean it when I say we felt very uncomfortable! We did not get ready in a fancy hotel room, nor we had an army of bridesmaids and groomsmen. We wanted everything to be simple. But the way they were looking around was like they were so unhappy to be there.

After seeing their behavior, still we did not judge them. We thought as long as they do their job right, we are ok. But they were so passive all through the ceremony and party. These are not our ideas only. It is the idea of every friend and family member. At the morning brunch the next day, the first thing everybody told us was “what was wrong with your videographer and photographer? Why did you choose such passive people? Why did they seem so disinterested?”

Anyway, after we got ready at home, they headed directly from home to church. We have no photos or video in the limo. We have never seen a wedding video without the limo footage! Once we entered the church and the ceremony started, I did not see the photographer and the videographer. I noticed they are standing at the back of the church. I was so confused because this was a catholic wedding meaning that we were facing the altar and I did not expect them to be standing at the back. I was so tempted to stop the ceremony and go ask them to move to the front of the church but of course I couldn’t. They both remained standing at the back of the church and never moved! (except once that the photographer came to the front for a few minutes because we specifically asked him to).

After the ceremony, when we arrived at the hall for party, they were straight heading into the hall with no intention of having an outdoor couple shoot. We were like: wait a moment! How about our outdoor shoot? In every wedding photoshoot and videoshoot, the outdoor shoot is a big part of it. It is a must! They were like, OK, we will do it if you want!!! So, we did it but it was a disaster! Instead of finding good angles and suggesting poses, the photographer was just standing there. We were like: Should we take a photo here? How should we pose? What should we do? Tell us for God’s Sake!!!

Anyway, having said all that, we still held a positive attitude and hoped that photos and videos will be good. But when we received the photos, we were sooooo shocked! Even I could do better than that!!!

The photos in the house where we got ready are dark. The photos in the hall are the same. The outdoor photoshoot is a real disaster. We don’t even have some good photos to frame and put on the wall! The photos our friends and family took with their phones are much better.

I called the Pros to complain. The director of production, Scott Mitchell, who reviewed my complain said I am wrong and the photos are perfect. He had a very bad attitude and talked as if I owe HIM an apology!!! When I said the photos are not comparable to wedding photos I have seen from other weddings and also on their own website and Facebook page, he said because they are edited. No, it is not. I have had several photoshoots before and I have seen my photos before being edited. They all looked beautiful. Apparently, if you want edited photos, you need to pay more. But the poses and the lightings are so bad, that no editing would fix them. When we showed the photos to our friends and family, they said: These are nice photos, but where are the photos from your photographer? We said: These are the ones. They were like: Are you kidding? These are professional photos? Unbelievable!

Then we got the video. The video is a disaster too. It is a terrible color, dark, and of course poor angles. The video starts with very dark shots from us getting ready in the house (the room was not dark at all!). Then, just like the photographer, he rushed to the church. We have no videos in the limo.

The Church video is a disaster. All throughout the ceremony, he had the camera on the stand at the back of the church. He did not move one inch. All you can see is our backs. When I told Scott about it, he said that’s our protocol. He said you saw our sample video and you should have known they film from back of the church. The sample that I saw was not a Catholic ceremony. Bride and groom were facing each other, so it was OK to film from back of the room. I thought anybody with some common sense would know they should film from the front of the church in a Catholic ceremony. All my catholic friends and family have beautiful photos and videos from the front side of church but according to Scott it is their protocol and the videographer could not deviate from it. So, basically, they don’t care about the differences between ceremonies. It is like mass production. They don’t see customers as individuals. They give the same service to everyone and will not customize it based on your needs.

The video of the party is not any better. The hall was very bright (I personally asked the hotel people to increase the light because I wanted a bright hall) but the video is so dark and quality is low. The angles are terrible too. Instead of standing a little far and holding the camera up to have a view of the dancefloor, he was standing right beside the dancefloor. You can only see people passing and blocking the camera and you can hear people talking in the dance floor.

The video is supposedly HD which is hard to believe. The videos my friends recorded with their cellphones are way better, both in quality and in angles. The videos we saw online were far better than what we got. The samples they put on their website and specially Facebook are very deceiving. Our disastrous photos and videos are not comparable to those samples at all. And after ruining your best memories, they talk to you unapologetically. According to Scott Mitchell, everything was based on their protocol and there was nothing wrong with what we got.

Also, we showed the photos and videos to family and friends without complaining or saying anything (we just wanted to see their reaction and honest opinion). Everybody, and I mean everybody, said they were terrible!!! We have seen many wedding photos and videos from our family and friends’ weddings and I am telling you non of them are so terrible. We don’t even have a few good photos to frame and put on the wall. We are embarrassed to show them to anyone. We will regret it for the rest of our life.

We have collected all the videos from friends and family and are planning to mix them together to make a good video of our wedding. We are also planning to dress up the same as our wedding day again and have a professional photoshoot so that we can have some good photos to create a wedding album since we are really embarrassed to show these photos to people. We could have paid $1,500 more and get a great package from a good studio. This is going to be the biggest regret of our life! Please, please, please do yourself a favor and spend couple of thousand more and get a good photographer and videographer. It is not worth ruining your memories. You can’t repeat your wedding day and you will regret it forever!

We cancelled our wedding that was over a year and a half away, and these people still want us to pay 50% of the price for something they haven't even done yet. They're keeping the deposit, which is $250, and the price of the photographer is over $2000. It's a total rip-off, and there are bad reviews about the place all over the internet. They're rude, and refuse to deal with you, and don't care about their customers, or that people's weddings mean something to them. All they care about is money, and are not someone that should be hired. If something were to go wrong with your wedding, and you have to cancel for any reason, they won't care. They won't cancel the rest of the bill even though they haven't provided any services. Save yourself the hassle, even if it is only a possibility. There are better and less costly photographers out there besides these rip-off artists. Don't hire them. 

From the consumer prospective nothing is more frustrating than a company who doesn't admit when they have made a mistake, who tries to blame you for their mistake and fails to act until pressured to do so. And no, this customer was not happy at all. We were(and still are) both very angry that your company ruined an extremely part of our wedding day.  Being in the wedding industry I would hope you are aware of how important weddings are to people and the sensitive nature surrounding them.

Please let us know what part of the review is an exaggerration because we are happy to provide the proof that it is not or remove it from our review.  And yes, I agree with you that we were not sensitive to you or your staff's feelings while writing our reviews. However this is because we were met with great insensitivity when discussing our complaint.  Both Vince and yourself kept focusing on the parts of this interaction that you felt we handled poorly while avoiding owning up to your own mistakes. 

In today's business world reviews that are available online are very empowering for customers.  It gives us a way to get insight from real people before entrusting someone with something as important as shooting a wedding video.  We left these reports because we don't want anyone else to go through what we did.  And if they do we believe they should at least be well aware of the risk they are taking.

Most trustworthy buisinesses are able to garner enough positive reports to make up for the negative reports they receive. So yes, your staff will have to live with this being online forever.  However you and they do their job right, it won't matter because you prove to the online community exactly what you said, "there problems and mistakes along the way...rarely". But do not blame us because your online reviews right now show that this happens more often than rarely.  It is your job to find a way to create happy customers to offset this.

I think its very unfortunate that through all of this we couldn't even get a sincere apology.  In reality our reviews remain unchanged because were still left feeling like this was a company who didn't really care about us.  Had we been met with the same concern that you are showing for the reputation of your business I think we could have both been much happier.  

Once again please refrain from claiming that I exaggerated without providing at least some supporting evidence. Because even though I am very angry about this situation I made much more of an effort to be accurate in my review than you did to "bend over backwards" and help us.

So frustrating indeed...

Christopher Williams
Honest Reviewer of Good and Bad Businesses
Husband to a hurt and angry wife
Father to future children who won't be able to see important parts of his wedding
I will make my point on this site or the next

P.S. We never recieved our corrected video with the proper wedding date.

"If you don't offer a partial refund for our concerns, I will have my husband Chris go to every website he can find and write the worst review possible!" 

Nothing is more frustrating than a customer who uses the internet as leverage for their demand.   We take every customer's concerns very seriously but this customer was much happier making a extortion game out of their concerns. 

Most of this review is an exaggeration of the details of their concerns.  What gets lost in all of this is the insensative trashing of members of my professional staff and network.  These are professionals who dedicate their lives to perfecting their craft all in an effort to provide the very best to their customers.  Are there problems and mistakes along the way...rarely...and trust me, no one takes it harder than the professional.  Imagine you have a regrettable day at work...and two months later it's detailed online for everyone to read...forever.  

It's unfortunate that Chris used full names and exaggerated virtually every detail to prove his case.   We bent over backwards to help them but it didn't seem to matter.

So frustrating...

Hugh Riley

Vice President