[Resolved]  Cox & Kings India — unable to book a tour - paid the booking amount. no response from the travel advisor

I am writing this email to you in the hope that maybe you will look into our concern and provide justice to a first time customer visiting cox and kings website to plan a family holiday abroad with total trust and faith that we will be guided in the whole process and would have an amazing holiday planned by the renowned 'Cox and Kings".

Me and my brother reached out to online portal to book a Switzerland customized package.
it was around 15th of April that we contacted and Kaustubh Sansare from Mumbai, was assigned as our trip advisor. He came up with an itinerary as per directions from us . We paid a booking amount of 80k/- on 24th and 26th of April, 2018. The trip was planned for 5 days and 4 night in last week of May, i.e 21st May to 25th May, 2018.

After the amount had been paid, there was no contact with Kaustubh . I tried to follow up via emails and phone but was not updated much on the flights whether they were booked or not . He wouldn't reply my emails, neither would answer on his extension . When tried calling from front office, we were said that either he will call us back in the evening with the confirmed flight tickets or that he is on leave.

We waited and waited, i kept emailing and calling almost on daily basis but in vain.

Then finally i get in touch with another lady, for a quality check call and they process it only on 4th or 5th May, 2018 . But she informs us that the visas would not be processed and she suggested us to change the dates .

On 6th May, 2018, we asked Kaustubh to shift the dates to 4th June to 8th June, 2018. He agreed and planned the itinerary accordingly .

But again after that he didn't contact us for any further proceedings .

I waited till 10th of May, 2018 and finally write to your customer care regarding the matter as i was concerned about Visa processing which was the case we changed our dates.

We get an email to be patient and that they will look into the matter.

But all we got was an email from another visa processing guy on 11th May, 2018, evening to submit the documents latest by next morning . The next morning being a Saturday, with bank holiday .

I don't know with what frame of mind he asked us to submit the documents by next morning. I visited your branch and they suggested to change the dates again as it was not feasible to process the visa in such short time as we had to travel on 4th June, 2018.

I got back to Kaustubh and the other guy Tejpratap to change the dates but they were pushing that visa will be processed contrary to everyone's else suggestion.

We asked him to get the visa dates from Delhi but then he comes back to us and demands for an extra charge as the visa dates were not available and he will arrange walk-ins.
Now we didn't agree for paying the extra amount as we were not at fault for the delay in the assigning of the file .

and again to change the travel dates, they asked extra charge for flight re-booking .

Now in the whole scenario we demanded an explanation, that why would we as a customer play extra amount, when it was delay on their part to process the case.

But they never agreed and kept on demanding for more charges. In the mean time i wrote to the customer care and Kaustubh's manager again for explanation but no response.

So now loosing all hope and trust we asked them to cancel the trip and refund our amount, they have charged us a hefty amount .

We were new to this whole process and instead of being guided properly and have an amazing vacation we get such disappointment. Such high brand and such incompetent professionals. We trusted these guys fully and didn't know we will be fooled and end up draining money out our pockets. We belong to a middle class and the amount really matters to us . And more than money, it is the matter of trust and services they provide.