Event planner AI assistant for wedding, party and corporate planners

It's a Saturday in late June. You're at a country house hotel at 7am, laying out place cards for a 140-guest wedding, and your phone has been buzzing since you arrived. Two Instagram DMs from couples who got engaged at Christmas, a WhatsApp from a caterer about the arrival time, a website enquiry for a company summer party, and a missed call from a number you don't recognise. You won't look properly until Monday. By then one of the couples will have booked a discovery call with the planner who replied first. An event planner AI assistant answers those enquiries while you're working. It asks for the date, the guest numbers, the budget and the venue, tells the enquirer whether you're likely to be free, answers the questions you're asked every week, and books a discovery call. Anything that needs your judgement or a commitment, such as holding a date, quoting, or sorting out a supplier problem on the day, comes back to you.

This page is for independent wedding planners, party and celebration planners, corporate event organisers and small agencies with a coordinator or two. It covers the enquiries you get and when, what the assistant can take on, what it must hand back, three sample conversations, setup, costs and the rules that apply to events.

The enquiries an event planner gets

Event planning runs on enquiries. Each one is a possible booking worth hundreds or thousands of pounds, and the person sending it has usually messaged three or four planners at once.

First enquiries

The classic first message is short: "Hi, are you free on 13 June next year?" Sometimes there's more: "We're getting married in the Cotswolds, about 100 guests, budget around £30k, what do you charge?" Sometimes it's a voice note. What you need to know before you can reply sensibly:

• The date, or the month and season if they haven't fixed one
• The type of event: wedding, milestone birthday, christening, corporate party, product launch, awards dinner, conference
• Approximate guest count
• Venue, if they have one, or the area
• Budget, or at least a range
• The service they want: full planning, partial planning, on-the-day coordination, or design only
• How they found you

Most enquirers don't give all of that, and the first reply, asking for it, often gets lost in the shuffle. An assistant can ask for it immediately, at whatever hour the message arrives.

Availability questions

"Are you free on the 13th?" is the commonest question in the trade. The honest answer often depends on more than your diary: a planner might take two small events on one weekend but never two weddings, or keep a day free before a big event. The assistant can work from a list of the dates you're already committed to and tell an enquirer whether the date looks open. It shouldn't promise a date is held. Only you do that, normally once a contract is signed and a retainer paid.

Pricing questions

"What do you charge?" comes in every enquiry. Many planners publish a starting price, for example "full wedding planning from £3,500" or "on-the-day coordination from £950", and quote individually after a discovery call. The assistant can give your published starting points and explain what changes the price. It shouldn't quote.

Supplier questions

Event planners get two very different kinds of supplier contact.

• Suppliers pitching to you. Florists, photographers, bands, venues, stationers and caterers asking to join your recommended list or to send a brochure. These are worth logging but rarely urgent.
• Suppliers working on your events. A caterer confirming numbers, a marquee company asking about access, a band asking about the power supply. These matter, and on the day of an event they can be urgent.

Couples and clients also ask about suppliers: "Who do you recommend for flowers?" "Can we use our own caterer?" "Do you work with Hartley Hall?" The assistant can answer from your preferred supplier list and venue notes, and hand over anything else.

Existing clients

Clients already booked with you message about their event constantly: changes in guest numbers, a new idea from Pinterest, a question about the timeline, a worry at 11pm. Most of these need you. The assistant can acknowledge them, record the detail and flag the conversation, so nothing gets lost in a busy week.

When the messages arrive

Event planning enquiries arrive out of hours more than in almost any other business. Couples plan their wedding in the evenings and at weekends. Corporate organisers send enquiries from their desk during the working day, but they want a reply the same day or they move down their list. And your own working hours are the opposite of an office's: weekends are event days, weekdays are site visits and supplier meetings, and evenings are admin.

The planning year

Event planning has some of the clearest seasons of any business:

• Christmas to Valentine's Day: engagement season. Many couples get engaged over Christmas and New Year, and January and February bring the year's biggest wave of wedding enquiries, just as you're pitching for corporate summer work.
• May to September: wedding season. Your weekends are taken by events. Enquiries keep coming, mostly for the following year, and they land while you're on site.
• Spring: corporate summer parties and away days. Companies start planning summer events in March and April.
• Late summer to autumn: Christmas parties. Corporate Christmas enquiries often arrive between August and October, during the end of wedding season.
• Autumn and spring: conference season. For corporate planners, conferences and awards dinners cluster away from summer holidays.
• December: milestone parties and New Year's Eve.

The overlap is the problem. The months when enquiries peak are the months when you're least able to answer them.

What an event planner AI assistant does

The assistant's job is to turn a vague first message into a qualified enquiry with a booked call, and to answer the routine questions so you don't have to.

Collecting the enquiry details

Give the assistant your question set for each type of event. It asks them conversationally, a couple at a time, and saves the answers as a lead in your Klugon dashboard. A wedding question set might be:

1. Names of the couple
2. Wedding date, or preferred months and days of the week
3. Venue, or the area they're considering
4. Approximate number of day and evening guests
5. Approximate overall budget
6. The service they're interested in (full planning, partial, on-the-day)
7. Anything special: abroad, multi-day, a particular culture or faith tradition
8. How they heard about you

A corporate set would ask for the company, the event type, the date, attendee numbers, the location, the budget, and the decision-maker's name. Keep each set short. The aim is to have enough to decide whether to take the call, not to plan the event in chat.

Saying whether a date looks free

Paste in a list of the dates you're committed to, and keep it up to date. You can also add notes such as "never two weddings on one weekend" or "no events in the last two weeks of August". The assistant then answers availability questions from that list with careful wording: "That date looks open at the moment. Dates are only held once we've agreed the booking." That's honest, and it stops an enquirer assuming their date is reserved.

Booking discovery calls and consultations

Klugon's built-in calendar works from your working hours and the appointment types you set up. A planner might offer:

• Discovery call, 30 minutes, by phone or video
• Consultation meeting, 60 minutes, in person or video
• Venue walk-through, 90 minutes, for booked clients only, by arrangement
• Corporate briefing call, 45 minutes

You can set buffers between appointments, a minimum notice period, closed dates for your event days and holidays, and the hours each appointment type is offered. If you work Tuesday to Friday on calls and keep weekends for events, the assistant only offers those days. On the Business tier and above, the assistant can also check busy times in Google Calendar, Outlook or Apple Calendar once you've connected them, which helps if your site visits live in your personal calendar. If you already send a Calendly link for discovery calls, the assistant can send a single-use Calendly link in chat or on WhatsApp instead. Calendar connections aren't automatic two-way sync, so keep an eye on both diaries.

In chat and messaging the assistant can move or cancel a booking. On the phone it can cancel, but not reschedule.

Answering the everyday questions

These questions come up in nearly every enquiry, and the assistant can answer them from your own material:

• What's included in full planning, partial planning and on-the-day coordination
• Starting prices and what affects the final fee
• How far ahead couples usually book you
• Which areas you cover and whether you charge travel
• Whether you plan weddings abroad
• Whether you work with any venue, or only certain ones
• Who your recommended suppliers are, and whether clients can use their own
• How booking works: discovery call, proposal, contract, retainer
• What happens if the event is postponed or cancelled, in your contract's own words

Catching Instagram and WhatsApp enquiries

Instagram is where many couples find wedding planners, and WhatsApp is where many prefer to talk. Klugon's social agent answers Instagram DMs, Facebook Messenger and WhatsApp, as well as the website chat widget and the phone. Each channel needs some setup. WhatsApp needs a Meta WhatsApp Business number connected with your own Meta app. Instagram needs a professional account linked to a Facebook Page, and Meta must approve the messaging permission through its app review before the assistant can reply to the public. Plan for that review before engagement season, not during it. The Instagram DM automation page covers the steps.

All conversations land in one Klugon inbox. You can reply yourself on WhatsApp, Instagram and Messenger within Meta's 24-hour window.

Logging supplier pitches

When a florist or band messages to introduce themselves, the assistant can thank them, take their name, business, website and what they offer, and save it as a lead or note. You go through them when you have time, instead of having pitches scattered across three inboxes.

What the assistant hands back to you

Write these into the assistant's instructions. For each, it takes the details, tells the person you'll be in touch and roughly when, and flags the conversation.

Holding a date or confirming a booking

The assistant never says "your date is held" or "you're booked". It can say the date looks open and book a call. Holding a date is your decision, made on your terms.

Quotes and proposals

It gives your published starting prices and nothing more. A couple asking "so would it be £4,000 for us?" gets a polite explanation that you'll put together a proposal after the call.

Money

Klugon doesn't take deposits or retainers for bookings, and the assistant shouldn't take card or bank details. Tell it to direct all payment questions to you. Change-of-bank-details requests from anyone, client or supplier, are a classic fraud and must always go to you.

Existing client changes

"We've lost 15 guests." "Can we move the ceremony to 1pm?" "Mum wants to bring the dog." The assistant records these and flags them. It doesn't confirm that the change is fine, because it doesn't know what it means for the venue, caterer and timeline.

Supplier problems on event days

A caterer whose van has broken down, a band who can't find the venue, a florist whose delivery is late. These need you, now. The assistant can't put a call through, so it can only flag them. The practical fix is to give every supplier on an event your mobile number, or your coordinator's, for the day, and to tell them not to use your main line or Instagram on the day. Then tell the assistant: "If a supplier contacts us on an event day about that event, give them the on-the-day contact number in our knowledge and flag the conversation."

Complaints and difficult conversations

An unhappy client, a dispute about a final invoice or a worry about a supplier's no-show. These go to you without discussion.

Safety and licensing questions

"Can we have fireworks?" "Do we need a licence for the bar?" "Is the marquee safe in high winds?" The assistant can say these are questions you'll cover with them and the venue, and flag the conversation. It shouldn't guess.

How handover works in practice

When the assistant hands over, the conversation is marked "escalated" in your Klugon inbox with a "Needs a person" banner, and a post goes to Slack or Zapier if you've connected one. Klugon doesn't send email or text alerts. A planner working alone usually connects Slack on their phone, or uses Zapier to route handovers into a tool they already check. The assistant isn't paused after flagging, so if a client keeps writing, it keeps replying. Its replies should stick to the same message: you've got it, you'll be in touch.

Sample conversations

These are sample conversations. The planner, clients and suppliers are made up, and the wording illustrates the pattern rather than reproducing real exchanges.

Sample Instagram DM: a wedding enquiry in engagement season

A sample Instagram conversation with the assistant for Juniper & Vale Events, a fictional wedding and party planner. It's 9:50pm on 3 January.

The assistant gave real prices from the planner's published list, said the date looked open without promising it, and booked the call. Ellie wakes up to a lead with the date, area, guest count, budget and service already filled in.

Sample phone call: a corporate summer party

A sample call to Juniper & Vale's assistant. It's 12:40pm on a Wednesday in March, while Ellie is at a venue visit.

The caller's licensing question went to Ellie rather than being answered with a guess. Ellie gets the company, dates, area, numbers, budget and style before the call.

Sample website chat: a supplier question from a booked couple

A sample website chat with Juniper & Vale's assistant. It's 10:30pm on a Sunday in April.

This conversation was flagged, because it's an existing client asking for a change that affects the venue and budget. The assistant gave general context from the planner's approved notes, but didn't say yes or no.

Setting up an event planner AI assistant

A setup checklist for planners

1. Write your services and starting prices. Full planning, partial, on-the-day, design, corporate. Use the same figures as your website.
2. List your committed dates. Add notes about your rules for taking events. Update the list whenever you sign a booking.
3. Write question sets for each event type. Weddings, private parties, corporate events.
4. Write your booking process. Discovery call, proposal, contract, retainer, in plain language.
5. Add your supplier and venue notes. Recommended suppliers, venues you know well, your rules on outside suppliers.
6. Set up appointment types and hours. Block your event days and site visit days as closed dates or outside your hours.
7. Write the hand-back list. Holding dates, quotes, money, existing client changes, event-day supplier issues, complaints, safety and licensing.
8. Add your on-the-day contact rule. Give suppliers a mobile number for event days, and tell the assistant about it.
9. Write your own greeting. Klugon's default greeting doesn't say it's an AI. Say so in your greeting; couples appreciate knowing.
10. Connect your channels. The website widget is a script tag you paste into your site, and works on any site builder. Connect WhatsApp and Instagram through Meta, leaving time for Instagram's app review.
11. Connect Slack or Zapier. So handovers reach your phone.
12. Test it with real questions from last year's inbox. Paste in ten genuine enquiries and see how the assistant replies.

Keeping your number

If you have a business number on your website, forward it to the Klugon number with your phone provider's call forwarding, either all the time or only when you don't answer. A planner who works from a mobile can usually set "forward when busy or unanswered". Phone numbers can be added after the 7-day trial; during the trial, you test the assistant in the browser. Numbers can't be ported.

Working alongside your planning software

Many planners run their business in HoneyBook, Dubsado, Aisle Planner or Planning Pod, with proposals, contracts, invoices and timelines. Klugon doesn't connect to those. It sits in front of them: it catches and qualifies the enquiry, books the call, and leaves the proposal, contract and payment to your existing tools. Leads export as CSV. On the Business tier, the assistant can send leads to HubSpot, Zoho or Pipedrive; Notion and Mailchimp connections can add each lead automatically. Many planners simply copy the lead details into their planning software after the discovery call.

Languages

The assistant answers calls in English, German, French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, Dutch, Japanese and Arabic. That helps planners who work on destination weddings, with international families, or for corporate clients with overseas guests.

What it costs

Klugon prices in US dollars, with three separate products. Most planners start with the social agent, because Instagram and WhatsApp carry most of their enquiries.

Paying yearly takes 20% off. A connected WhatsApp number is $19 a month and a phone number $9 a month. Calendar connections need the voice or social Business tier. Every product has a 7-day trial; a card is required and is charged at the end of the trial unless you cancel. See the pricing page for details.

A worked example for a solo wedding planner

Assumptions to replace with your own:

• In January and February you get 60 enquiries a month across Instagram, WhatsApp and the website. In summer it's 25 a month.
• Because you're at events or on site visits, a quarter of them wait more than a day for a reply.
• One in ten of those slow-reply enquirers books with someone else who answered sooner.
• An average full planning booking is worth £4,000.

In peak months that's 15 slow replies, and 1.5 lost bookings: about £6,000 a month. In summer it's roughly 6 slow replies and 0.6 lost bookings, about £2,400 a month. Across a year that's real money, even if your estimates are generous.

The social agent Starter at $79, plus $19 for WhatsApp, plus the website chatbot Starter at $49, is $147 a month. Starter covers 300 social conversations and 100 website chats a month, which is plenty for a solo planner. If it saves one booking a year, it has paid for itself more than twice over. A small agency taking phone enquiries too might add the voice Starter plan at $99 plus a $9 number.

Against an assistant or virtual assistant

A part-time assistant working 15 hours a week at the UK National Living Wage of £12.71 an hour, the rate from 1 April 2026 for workers aged 21 and over, costs about £825 a month in wages before other costs. A good assistant or VA does far more than the AI: chases suppliers, builds timelines, sends proposals, and can come on site. But they also work set hours, and the most valuable messages arrive at 10pm in January. For many planners, the AI handles first replies and the VA handles everything after. The AI receptionist vs human receptionist comparison goes through the trade-off.

Contracts, licensing, safety and data

Event planning isn't a regulated profession in the UK the way law or financial advice is. But plenty of rules touch the conversations your assistant has, and it shouldn't stray into any of them.

Contracts and cancellation

If you agree contracts with consumers at a distance, for example by email after a video call, the Consumer Contracts Regulations 2013 give consumers information rights and, in many cases, a cancellation period. Your contract and pre-contract information should already deal with this. The assistant should repeat your terms, not summarise or interpret them. If someone asks "can I cancel and get my money back?", the safe answer is your contract's wording and a handover.

Destination weddings and travel

If you arrange travel and accommodation for a couple or their guests as part of a destination wedding, the package travel rules may apply. The government's Package Travel Regulations question and answer guidance explains when. This is for you and your adviser to decide. The assistant should describe what you offer in your words and hand over questions about travel arrangements.

Licensing

Selling alcohol or putting on regulated entertainment at a venue without a premises licence may need a temporary event notice. According to gov.uk's temporary events notice page, a TEN covers events of fewer than 500 people, including staff, lasting up to 168 hours, and a standard notice must be given at least 10 clear working days before the event. That's a useful fact for your own planning. It isn't something the assistant should advise a client on. Questions about licences go to you.

Safety

The Health and Safety Executive's event safety guidance covers planning, crowd management, temporary structures and working with Safety Advisory Groups. Safety questions, from marquee wind ratings to crowd numbers, are always for you, the venue and the relevant suppliers.

Guest and client data

You collect a lot of personal data: names, addresses, phone numbers, and guest lists. Some of it is sensitive. Dietary requirements can reveal health conditions or religious beliefs, which are special category data under UK GDPR. The ICO's UK GDPR guidance explains what that means. Keep the assistant's questions to what you need for a first conversation. Guest lists, dietary requirements and accessibility needs belong in your planning software, not in an Instagram chat with an AI.

Klugon is operated by a German company under the GDPR. Its sub-processors, including the AI and telephony providers, are in the USA under standard contractual clauses, as its privacy policy lists. Klugon doesn't record calls. You can export conversations and leads as CSV and delete individual records; full erasure is by email request. Mention the assistant in your privacy notice.

How it compares with enquiry forms and planning software

Most planners already have a contact form on their website, often from their planning software, and a pile of Instagram DMs. Here's the difference.

• Contact forms collect the right fields but don't answer anything. The enquirer still waits for you to reply with prices and availability, and meanwhile messages three other planners. The assistant answers the price and date questions immediately and books a call.
• Planning software handles proposals, contracts, invoices and timelines brilliantly. It isn't built to hold a conversation on Instagram at 10pm. Klugon doesn't replace it; it fills the gap in front of it.
• Instagram auto-replies and quick replies send a canned message. They can't ask about the date, check your committed dates or book a call.
• Leaving it until Monday works when you're not busy. In January and in July it costs bookings.

If your main worry is never missing a first contact, the guide to never missing a customer call covers the habits and tools that help, with or without AI.

Measuring whether it's working

After a month, look at:

• Enquiries captured outside your working hours, from the leads list.
• Discovery calls booked by the assistant, and how many became booked events. Mark converted leads on the leads page.
• Channel split, on the analytics page: are most enquiries coming from Instagram, WhatsApp, the website or the phone?
• Busiest hours, also on the analytics page. Most planners find enquiries cluster in the evening.
• Questions without a good answer, on the insights page. Each one is a gap in your knowledge or a question to add to the hand-back list.
• Your own reply time. Did handovers get answered within a day, even in peak season?

Frequently asked questions

Can the event planner AI assistant hold a date for a client?

No. It can tell an enquirer that a date looks open based on the list of committed dates you give it, and book a discovery call. Holding a date is your decision, made on your terms.

Does it work on Instagram?

Yes, after setup. You need a professional Instagram account linked to a Facebook Page, and Meta has to approve the messaging permission through app review before the assistant can reply to the public. Do this well before engagement season.

Can it send quotes or proposals?

No. It gives your published starting prices and explains what affects the fee. Proposals stay in your own process and software.

Can it take a retainer or deposit?

No. Klugon doesn't take deposits for bookings, and the assistant shouldn't take payment details. Retainers stay with your contract and invoicing process.

What happens if a supplier contacts me on the day of an event?

The assistant can't put a call through to you. Give suppliers a mobile number for event days, put that rule in the assistant's knowledge, and it will give the number to any supplier who contacts the main channels and flag the conversation.

Does it connect to HoneyBook, Dubsado or Aisle Planner?

No. Klugon doesn't connect to planning software. Leads export as CSV, and on the right tier can go to HubSpot, Zoho, Pipedrive, Notion or Mailchimp.

Will it send booking confirmations or reminders?

No. Klugon doesn't send confirmations, reminders, texts or follow-ups. The enquirer gets the booking details and a reference in the conversation, and you send your usual video link.

Can it answer in other languages?

On calls, it answers in English, German, French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, Dutch, Japanese and Arabic. That's useful for destination weddings and international guests.

Does it say it's an AI?

Only if you set it to. Klugon's default greeting doesn't. We'd recommend writing a greeting that says so, as in the samples above.

Before you decide

Set it up before your busiest enquiry month. Write your services, starting prices and committed dates, connect Instagram and WhatsApp in good time for Meta's review, and read every conversation for the first fortnight. Event planners share a lot with photographers, who face the same wedding-season crunch, and work closely with the insurance brokers who arrange event and public liability cover and the accountants who see the year-end side of a seasonal business. The professional services overview covers the wider group, the WhatsApp AI chatbot page explains the messaging side, and the Klugon AI receptionist homepage has the full picture.