Beware of Yatra. Review on Yatra

How do you book flights?

Do you set your start and destination airports, set the date and run search?

On multiple travel sites?

Then you look at the results and see who is offering the cheapest and book with them?

Last month I booked a one way flight from Mumbai to Goa for my daughter. I went through the above process on Jan 16th to book a ticket for Jan 19th. I checked several travel sites and Yatra was one of them. To my misfortune, I got the lowest rate on Yatra. I went ahead with the booking and as soon as the ticket was issued, I realised it had been issued for 18th instead of 19th.

That's when my problems started. On my browser, the last search on their website clearly showed I has searched for 19th. Yet the result had apparently shown me at least some flights for 18th. That is how the rate happened to be lower. Of course they claim it is my mistake. But that is not the point of my review.

Now let me tell you why I don't wish to ever use Yatra in future and why you shouldn't either.

1. The price shown on the search is not the price you pay. There is an additional charge of Rs 225/- which they conveniently call a "Convenience Fee". Make my Trip has no such addition. I don't think Cleartrip or Goibibo has either. Now you didn't know that when you were comparing prices on the site did you? This is a neat way to cheat every customer by lack of transparency. In my case, I ended up paying more than I would have paid for the same ticket on other sites.

   
   




2. Look carefully at their website. There is no phone number anywhere that you can call to resolve any issues. This is the biggest issue with them.

   
   




3. When trying to communicate with them, they never ever keep their word. They promise to call back within a certain time and they never do.

   
   




4. If there is a problem, you will spend a lot of time in your attempt to resolve it. During that period, they will string you along as if something is being done and the matter is being escalated but in the end you will realise that you wasted your time even bothering to seek redressal.

   
   

Back to my story. As soon as I booked, I realised in an instant it was for the wrong date. It was 6 pm. I found there was no phone number published on their website to contact in case of a problem. After looking over their site, I found a list of retail offices. Since I live in Pune, I called the Pune retail office number. A female came on the line and told me flatly she couldn't help at all when I narrated what had happened. She told me I should contact the back office who can trace what happened. She gave me an email address to write to. I told her it may take too long since the travel date was just 3 days away and ticket prices were rising. So please give me a phone number. She did so reluctantly but warned me not to expect much from it. She said that the back office team works till midnight so I would get a resolution the same day.

I tried the number but it rang without anybody taking the call. Then I sent an email.(BTW, till Feb 3rd I haven't even received an acknowledgement from them)

Next I tried to look for the flight on 19th and found that it now showed a price higher by about Rs. 400. I checked what it would cost me to reschedule but found that they were deducting almost Rs 3000 for rescheduling and only about Rs 1400 would be adjusted against my new booking.

I then called Spicejet and they were kind enough to reschedule the flight with a payment of Rs 1270/-.

Meanwhile, I searched the Yatra site and left a management feedback on their site about my dissatisfaction.

The next day, Jan 17th, I was called at around 1 pm by their customer care(Dharmendar). I narrated the whole incident and he promised me that the matter would be resolved within 24 hours, probably the same day itself. He also gave me a customer care number to use in future. There was no call till 4:30 pm on the 18th. I called them and had to repeat my whole story. The guy told me that the note made by the previous guy was that I would call although he had clearly told me that he would call me when it was resolved. I asked this second guy how can I call if I do not know when the problem would be resolved? Isn't it logical that they would have to call and let me know?

Anyway, he had no resolution ready in any case. He said he would have to contact the airline and he would call me in 30 minutes. He didn't call.

After that I had to go out of station for 10 days and had no time to follow up. Till Jan 31st I had not heard from them. I called them again on Jan 31st and I was told by one Sadhana that some Rahul had tried to call me on Jan 21st at 8:50 am but my phone was switched off. I recollected that it was a time when I was travelling and my phone battery had died towards the end of my travel. So they call once, 48 hours later than promised, find my phone is off and don't bother again to try my number till I call 10 days later?

Anyway, I don't know what he could have called about because Sadhana still couldn't tell me what the status was. She said she was escalating the matter and I would receive a call in 2 hours. This was at 5:30 pm. I called the next afternoon because, as is to be expected from Yatra, there was no call from them.

Each of these calls with them were for about 20 minutes. But this final call I made on Feb 1st took over 30 minutes. The guy Atta Ahmed put me on hold several times. He asked me whether I was looking for a full refund. I told him I wasn't.

I told him that I wanted Yatra to refund me Rs 870 which was the extra Rs 1270 I spent for rescheduling, minus the Rs 400 difference in price between the two days(Jan 19th price - Jan 18th price) tickets.

After a lot of holding and speaking he told me that their log shows that I had booked the ticket for Jan 18th so they would not refund any money.

I am writing this not because the 870 bucks hurts me. I am writing because my experience with them reveals they are a crappy company I will never deal with again because of their lack of pricing transparency and because their website does not provide an contact number for customer support.