Guides for organisers

Straight answers to the questions organisers actually ask us, on collecting money, running departures, and getting bookings off spreadsheets and DMs.

• How do you turn Instagram DMs into actual bookings?

  Instagram gives an app 24 hours to reply to a DM before the window shuts. Here is how that one rule decides which enquiries become bookings.

• Should a tour operator use Linktree in their Instagram bio?

  A link-in-bio tool holds links. It does not know your dates, seats, prices or payments. Count the taps between an Instagram story and money in your account.

• What is WhatsApp Business API, and does a tour operator need it?

  What the Business Platform is, what Meta charges per message, and why almost all of a small operator's WhatsApp traffic is free. Checked 10 Sep 2026.

• Which payment gateway should an Indian tour operator use?

  What Razorpay, PayU, Cashfree and Instamojo actually cost on a ₹2,000 booking, with GST added, plus TCS on foreign packages.

• How do you collect UPI payments for events without a gateway?

  Take UPI on your own ID or QR, keep the whole ticket price, and verify each payment with a checklist instead of a glance at a screenshot.

• How much deposit should you take, and how do you collect the balance?

  Size a trip deposit from your own non-refundable costs, run a day-by-day balance timeline, and see what splitting one payment in two actually costs.

• QR code entry with multiple gates for an event in India

  Any number of phones scanning one guest list, a code per ticket rather than per booking, and gates that keep admitting when the network drops.

• How do I sell tickets for a bhajan sandhya or kirtan night?

  Take pass money on the committee's own UPI with no platform percentage, keep payment screenshots out of the group, and let only a finance seat approve them.

• How do you verify a UPI payment screenshot?

  A screenshot never proves a payment. The UTR does, once you have found it in your own statement. What to ask for, and who should be allowed to approve it.

• What event ticketing actually costs in India

  Every layer on an Indian event ticket priced in rupees, from gateway MDR to platform cut to who bears it, run through a ₹1,000 and a ₹15,000 booking.

• The balance is due and nobody has paid. What do you send, and when?

  Three reminders on fixed offsets, a consequence the traveller already agreed to, and what an automated balance chase can and cannot do for you.