The Chapel Montville — Attraction in Sunshine Coast Regional

Please be weary and proceed with caution when selecting this venue. Do your research and read both the reviews on Google and Facebook. Our experience was disappointing an upsetting. We both fell in love with the beautiful views and the lovely message for why this venue was built. However from the moment we gave our deposit, we were treated horribly and like our money was not enough. The original wedding manager not only lost our contract 4 times, but our deposit once. On top of that they tried to extort us for money and bullied us out of original date. We had made a deposit in early 2022 for October 1st 2023. 4 months after placing a deposit they told us we needed to pay approximately an extra$800 for inflation. The package we had chosen was a ceremony only ($4400 excl. GST), which meant there was no food included and we didn't have a bar tab. When we requested clarification for the inflated cost, they told us it was for groundkeeping fees for the wedding from the previous night. When we pushed back against this charge we were told, we could only keep the original price if we moved our wedding date closer to the 2022 EOFY. To avoid further argument and disappointment we agreed to move the date. Once moved, it was very hard to get correspondence with the wedding manager. We then received a phone call from Melissa a new wedding manager, informing us that they cannot find any information about our wedding and would like know our date and what package we were having. I became quite concerned and explained to Melissa the previous grievances we've had now this would be the 5th our contract has been lost. Melissa was empathetic and apologised and seemed to be embarrassed as she expressed I was not the first client to be treated this way. She assured me our experience would improve and to send her all our previous correspondence and contract through to her and to contact her in the new year. Come February 2023, I contacted Melissa off of a previous email thread to received correspondence from someone new asking us about what package we were having as they could locate the contract with that information, this is now the 6th time our contract was lost. I asked the new point of contact to please give me a call as I wanted to know if they could please confirm our wedding date. I was ignored for 2 days. When the new wedding manager contacted me, I found she was very apathetic and dismissive. She told me I really needed to let go of the past and was not sure what I wanted her to do. I stated we would like assurance that some will dairies our wedding date, file a copy of our contract and document our correspondence. I also explained my partner and I have been having disagreements about keeping the venue because of how we have been treated. So I politely asked due to all the unnecessary stress, could we please be compensated with complimentary tea and coffee. I was told she could see what she could do, however she stated "I would respectfully suggest you find another venue". I responded trying not to cry, with this venue means a lot and I don't wish to move to another venue, but to receive the basic customer service that was promised to us. She responded with I could see what I can do. There is so much more I would like to add to this story, but word limits. Unfortunately, we were still requested to find another venue and they kept forcing us to take our deposit back rather than to fix the situation. We were left with heartache and disappointment. Please seek other alternatives for your wedding, no one deserves to go through this unnecessary stress, extortion and gaslighting. After giving us the refund the attempted for us to book our wedding again but for the 2023 pricing. It was so hurtful and I honestly couldn't fathom how a wedding business could, bully people like this and take advantage of couples hearts, just to get more money. I know this is a business, however you enter into this for the exchangement of customer service and a pleasant experience. This did not happen and I feel they genuinely do not care...

This review is merely my personal opinion based on my first hand experiences organising a wedding at this venue.

The Chapel is a beautiful and aesthetically pleasing venue. Despite my recent negative experiences I readily admit this.

However, in my personal opinion, dealing with the staff was incredibly tedious. I personally found staff to be incredibly difficult to contact and found that they seldom followed up with anything. In my personal experience, the conduct of staff at the Chapel made organising a wedding at this venue quite difficult and stressful.

In addition to a lack of communication, despite paying approximately $3400 just for the ceremony, when we requested 15 minutes of night photos, we were informed that we would have to pay per hour for this. In my personal opinion, I do not believe this is fair.

In my personal opinion, decorating options were very restrictive, and for example we were not allowed to have rose petals or lanterns for decorations.

When I initially booked the Chapel, a staff member (who no longer works there) informed us that we would be able to have candles at the Chapel as long as they were not on the wooden altar. In addition to this advice, when my then fiance and I went to the Chapel for a rehersal the day before our wedding, a staff member informed us that we would be able to use the candles for our service as long as we purchased a "snuffer" and used this to put out the candles rather than blowing them out. Despite it being a public holiday, I sourced and purchased this item as per the request.

However, after purchasing candles and candle holders for approximately $450 and spending 45 minutes the day before the wedding meticulously setting up candles, my fiance received a phone call the night before our wedding informing us that the Chapel had taken all of our candles and candle holders away from the venue and had locked them in another building where we could not access our property.

When we asked for our property to be returned so that we could at least decorate our reception venue, we were told that we would have to take this up with the owner, that they would not give us the owners contact details, and that the owner would not contact us to arrange the return of our property.

Our candles were not returned to us until the day of our wedding when it was too late to use them. In my experience this added a great deal of stress and emotion to my fiance and I the night of our wedding, and meant that I wasted approximately $450 on purchasing candles and candle holders as well as a snuffer that we were unable to use.

In my personal opinion based on my experience with this venue I do not reccomend the Chapel and would rate the level of service I...

I had an appointment at this chapel in Montville on Saturday, August 10th at 3:30 PM. When I arrived, the gates were locked, and there was no one there to assist me. I called three times, left a voicemail, sent two emails, and received no response. It’s now Monday evening, and I haven’t received any apology or explanation for what happened.

I canceled a work shift to visit the chapel, and my partner did the same. We drove 2.5 hours each way from Gold Coast, so we spent 5 hours driving in total, wasting our time, money on gas, and missing out on earnings. I felt completely disrespected by this lack of commitment and professionalism.

I had initially intended to book this venue for my wedding, but after this experience, I would be afraid they’d forget my wedding day altogether and I’d be left staring at a locked gate again. I do not recommend this chapel—my experience was terrible. I was so excited to visit, but after this, even with a good discount, I wouldn’t trust them with such an...