Wedding Month Checklist: The Final Four Weeks

A wedding month checklist covers the final four weeks before the wedding: filing the Notice of Intended Marriage if it is not already done, confirming every vendor in writing, and building the run sheet the day actually runs on. Most of the big decisions are behind you by this point. What is left is confirmation, paperwork, and the one document every supplier needs a copy of.

What actually happens in the final month

Nothing new gets booked in the final month, or nothing should. The venue, the celebrant, the photographer and the caterer are locked in already if you started planning at any reasonable lead time. The work left is narrower and less forgiving: a legal deadline that cannot move, a guest list that has to become a seating plan, and a written brief every vendor needs before they can plan their own day.

An Australian wedding planner, answering a reader question about staying organised, put it plainly: a simple master checklist tracking booking status, payment dates and outstanding actions "can be a lifesaver in the final months before the wedding."² That is the shape of this checklist - one list, tracked in one place, not five threads split across email and text.

4 weeks out: the legal deadline

Australian law sets a hard floor on the Notice of Intended Marriage: it must reach your authorised celebrant not earlier than 18 months and not later than 1 month before the wedding date.¹ If the notice has not been lodged yet, this is not a "get to it eventually" item. Most couples file it well before the four-week mark, but if yours has slipped, the celebrant needs the signed form now - a prescribed authority can allow shorter notice only in limited circumstances, and the final month is a poor time to be testing that exception.

While the celebrant is on the phone, confirm the rest of the paperwork is complete: identity documents sighted, any prior divorce or death certificates provided, and the ceremony wording agreed if you are writing your own vows around the legal minimum.

Start, or open, a single master checklist now, with a column for booking status, one for payment dates, and one for outstanding actions per vendor.² Everything below runs off that one list.

3 weeks out: confirm every vendor in writing

This is the point to chase written confirmation from every vendor still owed one - arrival time, what they are bringing, and what they still need from you. Do it by email: 83% of Australian couples name email as their main channel with suppliers, well ahead of phone at 8% and text at 5%.³ It is also the channel that leaves a record if a detail gets disputed later.

Chase early rather than wait politely. Across the industry, 53% of Australian couples report being "ghosted" by a supplier at some point in planning, and 54% expect to wait up to 48 hours for a reply against just 22% who expect one within 24.⁴ A vendor who has gone quiet at three weeks out is a phone call this week, not a third email sitting in the same unanswered thread.

2 weeks out: guest count, seating, and money

Lock the final guest count. Every number below it depends on this one being real rather than approximate: catering, the seating plan, and every row of the run sheet with a head count attached.

Most Australian weddings run allocated seating rather than open seating - 83%, against 9% who let guests choose and 8% running a stand-up celebration.⁵ If the seating plan is still a draft, two weeks out is the last comfortable window to finish it before RSVPs stop trickling in and start demanding same-day answers.

Settle outstanding vendor balances this week rather than the week of the wedding. A payment chased on the morning of the ceremony is a stress nobody scheduled room for, and a master checklist that already tracks who is owed what removes it entirely.

1 week out: build and circulate the run sheet

Two Australian wedding planners, asked to describe a normal wedding day from start to finish, both landed on the same point: "most venues and wedding planners will create a detailed run sheet for you, so if you start to feel overwhelmed, it's always best to work closely with a professional to guide you through it."⁶ Professional or DIY, the run sheet is the one document that turns four weeks of separate confirmations into a single timed schedule everyone works from.

PlannedBy's run sheet generator builds that schedule from a single input, the ceremony time - deriving getting-ready, departure, guest arrival, family photos, reception and send-off automatically, and re-timing every row if the ceremony moves.

The run sheet does not go to everyone. One AU wedding blog lays out who actually needs a copy: every paid vendor - "photographer, videographer, florist, DJ, celebrant, coordinator, caterer, bar" - the MC plus the bridal party plus parents, and "one trusted family member as a backup point-of-contact."⁷ Send it as both a PDF for printing and a live link that can absorb a last-minute change without a fresh round of emails.⁷

The week before and the day before

Confirm arrival times with every supplier one more time in writing, even the ones who confirmed three weeks ago. Plans shift in the final week more than in any other, and a written reconfirmation costs five minutes against the alternative of a vendor arriving at the wrong time.

Assemble an emergency kit: safety pins, tape, a stain remover, pain relief, a phone charger, and a small sewing kit. None of it is expensive, all of it is genuinely disruptive to be missing at 2pm on the day.

Print the run sheet and email the live link to everyone on the recipient list above. If a rehearsal is happening, walk it against the actual run sheet timings rather than a separate rehearsal-only schedule, so nobody learns two versions of the day.

Day of: the checklist becomes the schedule

By the morning of the wedding, the checklist's job is finished. What is left is the run sheet: every vendor arrival, every transition, every anchor from getting-ready to send-off, timed from the one input that matters, the ceremony time. A month of preparation compresses into one document that everyone in the building reads from at the same time.

Frequently asked questions

What should be done exactly one month before a wedding?

Confirm the Notice of Intended Marriage has been lodged with your celebrant - it must arrive no later than 1 month before the wedding date under Australian law.¹ Alongside it, start a single master checklist tracking every vendor's booking status, payment dates, and outstanding actions.²

When is the Notice of Intended Marriage due?

Not earlier than 18 months and not later than 1 month before the wedding date, under section 42 of the Marriage Act.¹ A prescribed authority can allow shorter notice only in limited, specific circumstances.

Who actually needs a copy of the wedding run sheet?

Every paid vendor working that day - photographer, videographer, florist, DJ, celebrant, coordinator, caterer, and bar - plus the MC, the bridal party, parents, and one backup contact who is not the couple.⁷

What if a vendor stops responding in the final month?

Call rather than re-send the same email. Being ghosted by a supplier at some point in planning is common enough that 53% of Australian couples report it happening to them, and the fix is a phone call, not a third unanswered message.⁴

How should the final vendor confirmations be sent?

By email. It is the channel 83% of Australian couples prefer for supplier communication, and it leaves a written record if a detail is disputed later.³

What goes into a wedding emergency kit?

Safety pins, tape, a stain remover, pain relief, a phone charger, and a small sewing kit - the small, cheap items that are genuinely disruptive to be missing on the day itself.

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The final month, at a glance