Once you’ve got in touch with us, we’ll arrange a time of mutual convenience to chat through your ideas so far over the phone. A conversation at the start of the planning process allows us to nderstand precisely the type of trip you’re after and the style of accommodation that suits you best. A day or two later, we’ll email you a carefully crafted itinerary that has been designed especially for you, based on the ideas we exchanged during our call. If the plan isn’t quite as you had in mind, please don’t let that discourage you: our itineraries are entirely flexible. We’ll design every detail around you and can tweak or completely transform your journey until it’s just right.

Along with the itinerary, we’ll share a quote. We will have discussed rough figures over the phone during our initial chat, but if the cost is somewhat higher or lower than you anticipated, please don’t let that put you off. Accommodation contributes mainly to the overall cost of our tours, and we have a range of hand-picked properties to suit all tastes and budgets. Our minimum spend is ₹235,000 (approx. $3,299 per trip for itineraries up to six nights and ₹35,000 (approx. $489) per trip, per day as an overall average for those seven nights or longer.

After you’ve had the chance to digest our initial proposal, we can arrange a time to chat through your feedback over the phone (preferred), or we’ll wait for your thoughts via email. Based on your feedback, we’ll tweak your itinerary to suit your taste better. Together, we can continue developing your tour as long as you’d like, and we want you to be delighted with even the finest of details. Every traveller is different, so there’s no natural pattern as to how long this process takes. Some of our guests are ready after the initial email, whereas others spend a month, two or more investigating several different routes with us until we reach their final itinerary.

Do we add cost to your holiday? As we receive discounted rates from hotels, the total price you pay will only be marginally more than having made direct bookings yourself. In return, our guests receive expert advice and experience, local knowledge and contacts. Coupled with our exceptional customer care and attention to detail, the value of booking through Volds Travel is very reasonable.

It would be wise for you to compare tours with other agencies too, though when you do, please try to compare like for like. Beyond any otentially obvious differences, their tours could be of lesser quality, their guides not as experienced, or their vehicles not as well maintained. For a better idea of what it’s like to travel with us, you may like to read a few reviews from our recent guests by clicking here.

If you decide you’re happy with your itinerary and that you’d like to proceed, at this point, we’ll guide you through our reservation steps. In brief, to secure your arrangements, we ask for a deposit of 20% (we accept payments by debit card, credit card, or wire transfer). Secondly, we may also require a copy of your passport information page if your itinerary includes internal flights, train tickets, or safaris. Having received your deposit and passport copies, we’ll email you a booking confirmation and a receipt. We’ll also ask for your international flight details. These can be sent over at your convenience any time before arrival, as and when you have them arranged.

Your booking confirmation will clearly state your remaining tour payment amount and payment deadline, typically 60 days before arrival, though it can be more during peak dates (including November, Christmas and the New Year). We require all final payments at least 60 days before your arrival in India. Later than this and, unfortunately, we cannot guarantee your preferred hotels or other inclusions, many of which require our full advance payment. If you are reserving your tour less than 60 days in advance, rather than pay a deposit, we ask that you pay in full at the time of reservation. For guests whose tour falls within peak dates (including November, Christmas and the New Year), we require your payment 100 days in advance.

After confirming your arrangements with us, please keep in touch. It would be natural to have questions in the weeks leading up to your trip, and we’re always on hand to help. Otherwise, you would next hear from us a few days before your remaining payment is due as a brief reminder. Having received it, we’ll provide a revised booking confirmation for your records to reflect that your tour is paid in full (this does not apply if you’ve paid the total amount at the time of reservation, of course).

A week before your arrival in India, we’ll email you a copy of your tour documents and explain how to meet our representative at the airport. You can expect to receive documents including hotel vouchers, your itinerary, any e-tickets or train tickets, and a small booklet with information you may find helpful covering topics such as voltage, exchanging currency, and tipping norms.

With all our tours being tailor-made and responses carefully prepared by hand, depending on the complexity of your request, we may take up to two working days to respond. We appreciate your patience and assure you it will be worth the wait! Our typical working hours are 10 am – 6 pm Monday to Friday (IST). Indian Standard Time is 5.5 hours ahead of UTC.

Contact us to get started