A woman whose fiancé passed away suddenly while at work has won a battle to be refunded the cost of the wedding dress she had ordered to wear during their nuptials . Fiona Mullins , 44 , from Workington in Cumbria was left devastated when her factory worker boyfriend Kevin Elliott , 34 , dropped dead of unknown causes in December . As Fiona was too devastated with grief to contact the various wedding companies to start cancelling her plans for the big day , her daughter Rhiannon Clark took it upon herself to call the bridal shop where the dress had been ordered . Fiona Mullins with a picture of her and her deceased fiancé Kevin Elliott . But according to Rhiannon , staff at The Wedding Warehouse in Carlisle said they were unable to refund the £1,200 deposit . Rhiannon told The Mirror : ‘ They told her they could cancel the dress but the money would be held as a cancellation fee or they could carry on making it in case of a change of circumstances . ‘ We could not believe what she was hearing , what was her fiancé going to do - come back from the dead ? ’ Rhiannon then launched an online petition to get support for the deposit to be refunded , which attracted 6,000 signatures in the first day . After the store started to receive death threats to staff , they contacted the family to say that they would be refunding the deposit in full . Rhiannon said : I ’ m so pleased they agreed to pay the money but the whole family are still upset this was deal with so badly. ’ Bridal stores often have strict cancellation policies as many events can disrupt a wedding ( picture posed by model ) But the bridal store was forced to stump up the cash from their own tills though , as the designer who they had commissioned to make the dress had already started work on the garment and refused to hand back the money . Ailsa Taylor , Managing Director of The Wedding Warehouse , told MailOnline : ‘ We are very sorry for her loss but we have to deal with emotional situations all the time and each situation is different . ‘ We have people whose dad passes away or brides who are dying from ovarian cancer . ‘ In my personal situation , I would love to give everyone their money back but I have to have a viable business to look after our existing brides , pay my staff wages at the end of the month and put a roof over my family ’ s head . ’
Fiona Mullins , last December , from Cumbria , was engaged to marry Kevin Elliott , 34 , . But the factory worker died suddenly 44 . Fiona 's daughter tried to get her £1,200 deposit back but struggled . After launching an online petition , the bridal store returned the cash .