Future and past tense when asking questions

Question

If I am asking a friend about an event they invited me to in a few days is it wrong to say 'What time did you say it was?'

Answer 1

American English speaker here, and this is exactly the way I'd ask the question; both tenses shift to the past. However:

What time did you say the party is?

Is also correct, with no difference in meaning. I might be more inclined to the use the present tense if it's already the day of the party.

There's a distinction here between spoken and written English. In spoken English,

He said the party starts at 9 o'clock.

sounds absolutely fine. In written English it would look wrong or like dialect; it should read:

He said the party started at 9 o'clock.