Yatra.com: One of the most pathetic, cheating, * company where words won’t describe them.We have booked kerala package with Yatra.com for 5N/6D for Munnar(2 nights), Thekkady(1 night) and Alleppey(2 nights).
We have received a quote from yatra for these places and they have given us an option to chose the hotel from their list as the hotels provided by them in the itinerary were not appealing to us.
So we changed our hotels in Munnar and Thekkady as per our choice and yatra has insisted us on their choice for Alleppey(Houseboat). I have specifically mentioned them that we would be on a special occasion while in houseboat and don’t want to ruin our holiday while in Alleppey. He assured us the best of services.
So we booked the package with the hotels as below
Tea valley Resort(Munnar) - Suggested by us
Hotel Tiger’s Roare(Thekkady) - Suggested by us as we couldn’t find a better hotel in yatra list.
Houseboat Indraprastham(Alleppey) - Provided by Yatra
The World backwaters(Alleppey) - Provided by Yatra
Customer Service: The package came arounnd for 58k after discussing with yatra which was on a higher end and we would have been able to make a saving of 12-15k for the same hotels, if we have booked on our own. Since we were busy, we though of going for a package. Customer executive of yatra.com Mr. Waquar Khan was assigned for our itinerary and he promised to include Dinner coupouns and Sightseeing tickets at the respective locations when we have brought this notice of high price in comparison to direct booking.
Since we want to avoid the hustle of going through the hotel websites and fixing the sightseeing itinerary, we agreed to the package provided by Yatra.com.
Mr. Waquar Khan has been calling us 10-12 times a day to make the initial payment and when I have asked for the complete Itinerary and listing of offers he promised, he said he will generate them once they receive the initial payment.
So we went ahead and made the initial payment of 30% of the total amount for the package including flights.
We haven’t got any confirmation email from yatra on the payment made and haven’t got any call from waquar khan either and when I have called him a couple of days later he said that they have received the payment and he is working on the offers and itinerary and has asked for some more time.
A month passed by and we haven’t received any confirmations, Itinerary or any email from yatra. We were trying to reach waquar khan on his extension, but were unable to get him on phone.
We have started calling yatra help line as our travel date was approaching and they said Vouchers will be generated 15 days before travel. So I have asked them about the Offers that they have promised and the complete vouchers and Itinerary details so that I can make the complete payment. They said they don’t have an Idea on what Waquar has promised and they said they will arrange a call back from him. Still we haven’t got any call back from him. After continuously calling for 4 days to the yatra helpline, we got vexed and said to release the vouchers atleast so that we can verify the itinerary and make the remaining payment.
They simply said that we will get the vouchers and booking details only once we make the complete payment.
So, to our horrid luck, we have made the payment and we have received the vouchers on 8th Nov where our Journey date was on 20th Nov. So for a planned tour which we started in early September we got our travel vouchers 12 days prior to our travel. Luckily they haven’t increased any price.
Only positive thing we found from the booking was the Sub contractor who was arranged for our travel "Evergreen cabs" where the service was very prompt from Mr Anish(tour operator) and Juby(Car Driver) where professionalism could be seen for their work.
For the Itinerary we received Yatra has mentioned only sightseeing in Munnar and they haven’t mentioned what places are covered in sightseeing. Nor the Cab service has received any instructions on the same and they were hired for just for the transfers and sightseeing in Munnar. But the Cab service was courteous and showed us various places.
Our check-in in Munnar was perfect for Tea valley resort and we were happy with our decision on chosing the resort. We got a call from Yatra representative if we had any issues with check in at Munnar and we were happy atleast they had some respect for their customers.
After two days of our trip in Munnar we left for Thekkady where our stay was in Tioger’s roare a boutique hotel where we didn’t have much to do.
We had a special occasion on 24th Nov and we want to spend it on 23rd night on a house boat and we have received "Indraprastham" which they have claimed as the best among all the houseboats and assured us the best of services.
We arrived at the houseboat and instead of a one bedroom houseboat which was a part of our itinerary, it was an old 3 bedroom houseboat. Since they didn’t have availability of one bed room house boat, They have arranged us with this option. The houseboat is pathetic with flush not working in the toilet and dust everywhere. The crew didn’t understand English and Hindi and couldn’t understand much on what we were asking for. The food on the houseboat is below average and we didn’t have much of a choice and kitchen looked unhygenic and stinked a lot. They took us on a ride in backwaters for 3 hours and then docked up in a village where the real trouble began as it grew dark. There were lizards and mosquitoes all over the houseboat and the Television and DVD player were not working. There was no AC remote for our room, so we had to adjust with the set temperature of 29 in the night within the damp room and to enjoy our special occasion with my kid, wife and with mosquitoes and lizards.
So please avoid Indraprastham at any cost in case if you go to kerala and book any houseboat after inspecting it only. There were several houseboats which are new and provide much more facilities than this one. On our last day we stayed in The World backwaters suggested by Yatra which is very well appreciated and worth a stay.
Finally to conclude, please avoid booking with yatra and if necessary make the payment only once you receive a confirmation from them. Once payment is made, you have to spend so much of time following them up which you can use to research and book the packages on your own. Also please do a research on the hotels they are providing and don’t just consider them by their words and for Yatra, please try to learn some customer service skills and to respect people’s time and there are many other ways to earn money rather than cheating people with false promises. Instead of wasting money on getting brand ambassador as Salman khan for publicity, please provide a better customer service to your customers which will bring more publicity to you.
Caption’Creating Happy travelers’ is such a joke.