SOTC Complaints & Reviews

I had booked a honeymoon trip to Maldives via SOTC on March 27th for 3rd May to 7th May duration. Since Covid cases started rising in April, I felt it is not safe to travel and requested to cancel the trip on 24th April. I contacted Indigo airlines and got a full refund which was credited to SOTC only since the tickets were done by SOTC. I requested them to cancel resort bookings also and credit that money to my account. It has been 3 weeks since then. I have done multiple follow ups, still not getting any sufficient response. No one calls for any updates. I don't know if it is actually cancelled or not.
I want my credit to be done this week, or refund my full money back. I have lost trust in SOTC. I came to SOTC since it has a brand value.

We have gone through the vouchers and found that the hotels booked for us are inferior to the hotels mentioned before in the package .
Earlier hotel in Havelock was Silver sands beach resort and now we have been booked into silver sands village resort which is very inferior .
We request you to kindly book hotel of the same premium category .
Thanks and regards

Chaitanya Jain

I order samsung galaxy a7 from my old flipkart account.i lost my mobile and invoice, for police diary i need the invoice.i have my IMEI no,
i forgot my old account"s mobile number and mail id thats why i cant login my accout, kindly help me

I had paid for airline tickets through SOTC that were cancelled by the airline. I called the airline and they issued a full refund to SOTC to pay me back. SOTC then refunded only a portion after subtracting some amount from another unrelated transaction. This is fraudulent and illegal. I want a full refund.

I along with my parents (total eight people) booked for Europe trip in the month of April 2020. Advance amount was paid for travel and other expenses (approx.: 5 Lakhs). However, due to Corona Pandemic our trip was cancelled. Since then we are trying to contact the company but there is no response from their side. It is a hard earned money and so I am not in a mood to forgo this.

हम लोगों के बारह लोगों के ग्रूप ने 27 अक्टूबर से 1 नवम्बर तक के लिए तीन इन्नोवा की बुकिंग धर्मशाला-खज्जियर-डलहौज़ी-धर्�...⇄ के लिए करवाई थी। आयटिनरेरी में लिखित में लिखा था कि तीनो इन्नोवा में बीच की सीट जुड़ी हुई होगी और AC हमारी ज़रूरत के हिसाब से फ़ुल टाइम चलेगा। पर इन्नोवा बीच की सेपरटे सीट की थी और AC केलिए कहा गया की उसके लिए कहा नहीं गया है।ड्राइवर बिल्कुल भी मददगार नहीं थे। SOTC एजेंट हरीश गैकर ने भी कुछ मदद नहीं की, और फ़ोन भी अटेंड नहीं करते थे। मैं SOTC से बहुत निराश हूँ।
R. K. Agarwal
[protected]

Summer cost saver france with benelux with sotc
Booking id: hd00152095
Departure date:[protected]

I need a refund of the amount i paid, no one has been able to help me. I have reached out to a lot of people and most of them say that they do not work with the company anymore. Please do not make me go to the consumer court for this and i do not need a refund - my grandfather is diagnosed with covid 19 and we need the money for medical reasons

We booked our 15 days europe tour package with sotc travel company in nov-19. We paid rs 195000/- (For 3 pax) as advance deposit. The tour was due to begin from 03-june-20 from kolkata. But due to outbreak of covid-19 worldwide, the tour was called off by sotc.
But they didn’t have the minimum courtesy to even inform us about the official cancellation till the last minute.
When we enquired from sotc kolkata representatives...

I (Dr shashank gandhe along with my wife meenal gandhe wei am a senior citizen), have been traveling with sotc for past several years (Iam a loyal customer), i booked a tour for spain and portugal from 6th of june this year, which due to obvious reasons could not be conducted. No visa formalities, hotel booking, etc could be done due to corona, repeated reminders telephonic conversation with your dgm mr navneet, fell on deaf ears, no correspondence other than system generated email, was received by self, only telephonic assurances will not suffice. Pl revert back immediately, or i will be forced to adapt other measures. Never expected this from a company of your repute to behave with seniors in this fashion.

The company is scheduled to operate a customised ladakh tour from chandigar on 8.6.2020. As by way of advance they had already taken as deposit of ₹30000 initially on 31.12.2019 as minnimum depsit amount. Now they have cancelled the tour due to inconvenience of transit as there was unprecedented lock down all over the country. Now they have come with the proposal that they shall hold back the amount and offered us either we reshedule the tour to the same place by 31.3.2021 or to some other place within india by 31.3.2021. For this rescheduling by whichever option we are further required to pay an amount of ₹ 2500 per torist [we are 3 in number] which amounts to ₹7500 in addition to the amount of ₹30, 000. Disputing this ihave already mailed them; they have not replied to that. I shall look forward towards your intervention in this regard.

We had booked in sotc for europe package for 9 people by paying advance between april 16th to may 6th 2020.

But due to covid-19 situation the flight got cancelled and the tour did not happen. Whne we apoorahc the sotc they say they can provide travel voucher but will not refund. But at this dire situation we need the money back instead oif travel voucher which i thinkwe cannot utilize for the next 1 year

Kindly help us to get the money back from sotc

I had booked a holiday package with sotc for travel from 8th may till 14th may,
Trip was to sri lanka for 8 people (8 adults and 2 children aged 5 and 13).
Due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, travel is not possible and the same advisory has been given by the government of india.
Sotc advises me to use the booking amount for travel within the next one year time. But i do not wish to travel during that period.
I want full refund of the booking amount rs. 80000.

I have paid full money for 5 people for uk tour for may,
This included the syba (Secure your non refundable booking amount)
I have already mailed them that due to covid 19 obviously the tour cant go ahead. Informed them more than 45 days ago.
Still they are not refunding the money or even replying to my mails.
I think we will have to go to consumer court.

We had booked a tour to Egpyt April 8-18th. The entire tour was cancelled due to Covid-19. SOTC is keeping our money and is not refunding it even though the hotel, plane, cruise have all cancelled.

Sotc is saying their cruise supplier in Egypt is not refunding the money despite having already cancelled the cruise. This is not our issue but an issue SOTC has with their supplier that they need to deal with. We have paid SOTC directly for the service and now they cannot provide the service that we paid for and thus we should be refunded 100%

They are stealing our money and will not refund. We expect a full 100% refund as they cannot provide the service we had paid for.

Here is the sequence of events.
1. 9th feb - the booking was made by senior citizens for group tour to europe and contract was signed 40k/person was paid.
2. 24th feb - the cancellation request was raised on account of epidemic outbreak covid-19 to destination company (Italy and few countries within itenary) as per circular from who and health and welfare ministry of india
3. Sotc executive communicated that the cancellation amount is 36k per person which is 90% of 40k booking amount and was unable to explain the basis of deduction. It seemed an arbitrary call. The travel dates were more 60days advance and the cancellation request was raised within 2 weeks of booking.
4. Repeated follow up with your team and there is no positive response to the request
5. When asked about the clause under contract which covers the booking amount in cases like this, there is no answer, this is definitely a breach of contractual agreement
6. Please note the number of casualties reported in italy is already nearing 3k and under such circumstances, you are suggesting ppl over 65yrs to continue with the travel with your company or lose their money. Also there is a directive from the counsellate on cancelling all tourist visas to destination country and still you guys don't agree with refund?

During all our conversations, i have been asking about the contractual terms of refund which you say you agree in this condition but can't do anything about it??

Every sotc staff has different information, they don't provide correct & complete information.
Although they say that there are no hidden charges but the fact is "lot of hidden charges are there which the customer comes across till the departure date"
When you ask for air tickets, they don't give the tickets.
When you ask for a refund, they don't give you refund and say that tickets are booked.
Its a chor company, they should shut the company and simply start snatching money or extortion.
Visa services are pathetic, sotc staff dont even bother to check the documents and fill them correctly and fully.
Even when you have paid more than 50%, the price of tour keeps increasing, then why the hell are we taking a package and paying for it.

When you ask for a refund due to all this, the company officials simply say that no refund will be given and customer can go to court and claim money.

Worst services ever experienced

Book your tour yourself to have mental peace, everything can be managed

I had made a booking for thailand surprise tour with sotc for march 2nd, 2020 departure (Gs[protected] and now due to the coronavirus, i had decided against the trip.
I understand that this is not in the control of sotc and decided to take the hit of the charges that they collect in the event of the cancellation. They had the audacity to tell me that my and my better half will be fine and nothing will happen to us.

Now when i requested the cancellation, the 10000 that was to be refunded (According to the documents they made me sign that is the minimum amount that i should receive against the booking amount of 40000) they are flat out refusing to refund me any money.

I am at my wit's end, they made me sign a document stating how much i will receive back in the event of a cancellation and they are refusing to honor it.

They made me write back an email stating that i don't want the cancellation any more and they are telling me to wait and see if the coronavirus global epidemic will subside and i can they pay the rest of the amount and avail the tour.

Is this sotc operates its business to lie to its customers and collect money and not process any refunds when you are supposed to?

Looking forward to your response.

I booked a dubai package from sotc assuming them to be one of the best as i was travelling with my family, what we hoped to be a pleasurable trip turned out to be a trip full of negotiations and haggling. From the time we paid the initial amount for booking, sotc did not even once stand on their words. For every activity, hotel, transfer that we paid to sotc in advance, sotc started re-negotiating charging us extra while quoting exorbitant amounts. The itinerary mentioned while booking is just bogus as nothing is followed when you actually reach the destination.
If you want to travel 45-50 kms everyday for every inclusive meal in the package at your own cost, or if you want to deal with the most inhospitable, unaccomodating and people looking for making a quick buck at every oppurtunity they get only then should you book sotc. Overall it was a very bad experience!

Me and family planned a trip to jaipur with sotc india. We made payments as per the itinerary sent on email. But to our horror, when we reached jaipur, found that the whole plan was changed. There was no email or any form of communication to us regarding this change. When we called sotc, their resolution is "sorry we can't do anything about it now".
As we had further travel plans after the trip, all got impacted due to it.
Such cheaters!!

I have booked a tour with sotc for dubai by paying 40k as token amount. As soon as i booked i realised that the flight selected is incorrect and asked them to change it. They said they will charge me extra as per their policy. I have asked them to give me flight options so that we can decide but it has been more than 2 weeks they are not coming up with options. Every time they call they give 1 option and if we are not alright with it they ask for another 24 hours. This trip is booked for new year. We booked in advance so we could avail of early discounts but they are now just whiling time so we pay extra. This is harassment. I am currently receiving emails and call from shaize shaikh and kedar and below employees: dhasade, siddesh • siddesh. [protected]@sotc.in
Golchha, danesh • danesh. [protected]@sotc.in
Kerkar, pranav • pranav. [protected]@sotc.in
Soans, arnold • arnold. [protected]@sotc.in.

I am very troubled and when i said i am alright if they can help just refund me they said they will not refund the full 40k. The cancellation charge is 20k. Is is justified to charge 20k when they have not booked my flights, hotels or anything. It's 20k for bad customer service? I have travelled all over the world and this is so far my worst experience.