The term RSVP comes from the French expression, “Respondez s’il vous plait”. In any event, what this means is “please respond” and basically if you see this term written on an invitation or an invite to a party, it means that you need to tell the host whether or not you are planning to come along to the party or the event.

It does not mean that you should only respond if you are coming, or only respond if you are not coming, but it is asking you to please indicate either way what you intend doing, so that the host of the party can plan ahead and know how many people they are going to have at the event or the party. It is amazing how society standards, in terms of common manners, drop so much that one struggles to get a response these days and invariably when you hold a party, some people who have indicated that they are coming, will simply not pitch up without cancelling their initial invitation and others who never responded at all will not only arrive at the party but arrive with additional friends or guests. One is basically forced to always over-cater, and to over-cater considerably, simply because you cannot get a polite indication from people beforehand as to whether or not they are coming. I guess that the real reason is that people don’t actually understand what the term RSVP means – and I hope those of you reading this blog either do, or do now!