How to verify an Umrah travel agency

The short answer. There is no one Umrah number to check the way there is for Hajj, so do four smaller checks instead: confirm the registered company exists and that the bank account is in its name, ask for the Department of Tourist Services registration, ask who actually lodges the visa if it is not them, and see the office. Each takes minutes. Together they catch almost everything.

People often arrive expecting an Umrah licence number, because that is how Hajj works. Umrah is not arranged that way. Private Hajj is sold under a Hajj Group Organiser licence from the Ministry of Religious Affairs; Umrah is sold by travel agencies, and the Saudi side of it runs through operators attested to file the visa.

That means verification is a different job, and a slightly more patient one.

1. The company is real, and the money goes to it

This is the check that prevents the largest losses and it costs nothing.

• Ask for the registered company name in full. Ours is Hujjaj Travel and Tours

(Pvt) Ltd.

• A private limited company is on the public record. **SECP's company register is

searchable**, and a company that cannot be found in it is not the company it says

it is.

• The bank account must be in that same registered name, and you should get a

receipt. Money to a personal account is where recoverable problems become

unrecoverable ones.

If an agency trades as a brand name that differs from its registered name, that is common and fine. What is not fine is being unable to tell you the registered one.

2. The travel agency registration

Travel agents in Pakistan are registered with the Department of Tourist Services. Ask for the number. An agency selling tickets and hotels should have one and should not mind being asked.

If the agency issues its own airline tickets, IATA accreditation is a further check, and an easy one to ask about.

Ours are listed with the certificates photographed on the contact page. We publish them so that they can be checked rather than admired.

3. Who actually lodges the visa

This is the Umrah-specific one, and it is the question almost nobody asks.

A Pakistani passport holder cannot file an Umrah visa alone. It is issued through an operator attested by the Ministry of Religious Affairs, and the Nusuk app will not take an individual application. So one of two things is true of whoever you are speaking to: they file it themselves, or they hand your file to somebody who does.

Both can be perfectly legitimate. What you are entitled to know is which, and if it is the second, who. An agency that becomes vague at this question is the one to be careful with, because your passport and your money are about to travel further than you thought.

4. The office, and the year before this one

• Visit it. A desk, staff who were there last season, a filing cabinet. If you

are in another city, ask for a video call from inside the office.

• Ask for a family who travelled last month and permission to ring them. Umrah

runs all year, so unlike Hajj there is always a recent group.

• Look at how long the company has existed, not how long the Facebook page has.

What you should have before you pay

• The registered company name, matching the account and the receipt.
• The DTS registration number.
• A clear answer on who lodges the visa.
• The hotel by name, with the distance, in writing.
• The excluded list, the payment schedule and the cancellation terms, in writing.

If you have those five, you have done more checking than almost anybody, and you will not be the one sitting in an office afterwards with a screenshot.

What a straight answer looks like

Ask us for the registered name, the DTS number and who files the visa. You should get all three in one message, without a pause, because they are the reason to choose a company rather than an awkwardness to be managed. If you want to compare, our departures with their inclusions, exclusions and terms are on the Umrah packages page.

The judgement half, which agency actually suits your family once they all check out, is how to choose an Umrah travel agency. And the fraud patterns themselves, with what to do in the first hour if it has already gone wrong, are in how to avoid Umrah scams.