Booking Terms

These Booking Terms set out the agreement between you and EGYPTIA when you book a journey with us through egyptiatours.com or your EGYPTIA account. Please read them carefully, together with the Cancellation and Refund Policy, the Privacy Notice, the Cookie Notice and, where you use Reward credits, the Rewards Terms. When you tick the acceptance box before receiving payment details, you confirm that you have read and agree to these Booking Terms and the Cancellation and Refund Policy, and that you acknowledge the Privacy Notice and the Cookie Notice. Nothing in these terms is intended to take away any right that the law gives you and that cannot be excluded by agreement; where such a right is more favourable to you, it applies.

1. Who we are

EGYPTIA is the trading name of KEMETIA for Touristic Services, a company established in the Arab Republic of Egypt. In these terms, “EGYPTIA”, “we”, “us” and “our” mean KEMETIA for Touristic Services, trading as EGYPTIA. “You” means the lead traveller who makes the booking and, where the context requires, every traveller named in the booking. “Departure” means a scheduled date of a shared tour; “booking” means the arrangement made for the travellers named in it on one departure, or on one private tour.

You can contact us at info@egyptiatours.com or on +201091009132, through the contact form on our website, or through WhatsApp. Messages about a booking that is already in your account are best sent from that account, because they reach the team that looks after your booking together with its history.

2. Who may book, and the lead traveller

Every booking must be made and led by an adult, meaning a person aged 18 or over on the day of booking, who has the legal capacity to enter into a contract. The lead traveller makes the booking on behalf of everyone named in it and confirms that they are authorised to do so. The lead traveller is responsible for the booking as a whole: for accepting the price and these terms for the whole group, for making sure that the payments are made on time, for passing our messages on to the other travellers where needed, and for the accuracy of the information given for each traveller.

A person under 18 cannot make a booking alone. A child may travel only where a parent or legal guardian makes the booking, or authorises it, and provides or permits the child’s details. A booking can include up to 12 travellers. Larger groups, organisations, schools, companies and clubs are welcome to ask us for a private tour (section 4).

English is the reference language of these terms and of our booking documents. A translation, such as the Arabic version published with these terms, is provided for convenience and understanding; where the law requires a particular language or interpretation in your favour, that requirement applies.

3. Shared tours: how a booking is made

A shared tour is a scheduled journey on a published departure date, shared with other travellers. To book a shared tour you choose the departure, tell us who is travelling (the number of adults and the age of each child) and choose the rooms and, where a tour offers more than one, the hotel level. The website then shows you the exact price for your group in US dollars (USD) or euros (EUR), before you need to create an account or accept anything.

To continue, you sign in or create an account, check the summary of your booking and the price, and tick the single acceptance box. At that moment, the payment details for the bank transfer appear in your account and are also sent to you by email. There is no separate offer step for shared tours: the price you see and accept is the price of your booking.

Please note carefully: no place is reserved and no seat is held until our team has seen your deposit transfer arrive in EGYPTIA’s account at CIB (Commercial International Bank) and has verified it. Accepting the price, receiving payment details or uploading a transfer receipt does not by itself reserve a place. Until the transfer is verified, places on the departure remain available to other travellers, and if the departure becomes full before your money is verified we will tell you and return anything you sent. Once your deposit is verified, your booking is confirmed and your places are held for you.

4. Private tours

A private tour is a journey arranged only for your party, either as a private version of one of our published itineraries or as a tour designed around your own wishes. A private tour never shows an automatic price. You first send us your request with the information we need, and our team reviews it against availability, suppliers and costs. If we can offer the tour, we send you a written quotation that sets out the itinerary, the inclusions and exclusions, the price for each traveller (including any child prices) and the payment terms.

A quotation is valid for seven days from the day we send it. You accept it in your account by ticking the acceptance box, and the payment details then follow in the same way as for a shared tour. If a quotation is changed at your request or ours, the new quotation must be accepted again before it applies. A quotation that is not accepted within seven days lapses, and price and availability are then no longer guaranteed. Child prices for a private tour are those stated in the quotation; the shared-tour child percentages in section 5 do not apply automatically to private tours. Unless a quotation states otherwise, the payment rules in section 6 and the Cancellation and Refund Policy apply to private tours too.

5. Prices, hotel levels and children

5.1 What the price is made of

The price of a shared tour is a price per person for the whole journey. It has two parts. The tour price covers what the tour description lists for that departure, such as guiding, transport, domestic flights, entrance fees, the meals listed in the itinerary, and the nights that are part of the journey itself, for example nights on a Nile cruise or in a desert camp. The hotel price covers the ordinary hotel nights of the journey, and depends on the room type you choose: a single room, a double room (one bed for two), a twin room (two beds) or a triple room. Travellers who make their own accommodation arrangements may choose “own accommodation” and then pay the tour price only.

5.2 Hotel levels

Some tours offer two hotel levels, for example 3-star or 5-star city hotels. Each level has its own tour price and its own room prices, because the level may also change other parts of the journey, such as the class of a Nile cruise. Everyone in one booking stays at the same hotel level. Where a journey includes nights in an oasis lodge or a desert camp, those properties are described as they are; a local lodge or a camp is never described as a 5-star hotel, whatever level you choose for the cities.

5.3 Children

For shared tours, children pay a share of the adult tour price, according to their age on the first day of the tour:

• from birth to 2 years: 10% of the adult tour price;
• from 3 to 5 years: 50% of the adult tour price;
• from 6 to 11 years: 75% of the adult tour price;
• from 12 to 17 years: 90% of the adult tour price;
• 18 years or older: the full adult tour price (100%).

A particular tour may state different child prices, and where it does, the tour’s own prices apply. The child percentage applies to the tour price only and does not reduce the hotel price: a child who has a bed of their own pays the hotel price of the room in which that bed is, in the same way as an adult. A child aged 0 to 2 shares a bed with an adult and pays no hotel price, unless a separate bed or cot is expressly arranged and priced. A child price does not by itself guarantee a separate room, bed, cabin or seat; the rooms you choose and the arrangements confirmed in your booking decide this. Because age is measured on the first day of the tour, please give each child’s correct date of birth; if a wrong date of birth has led to a wrong price, we may correct the price before travel.

5.4 Currency and a fixed price

Prices are shown in USD and EUR. Until we publish a change, the USD and EUR prices use the same numbers; this is a pricing rule, not an exchange-rate conversion. You choose the currency in which you pay, and your booking, your payments and any refund remain in that currency. We do not accept Egyptian pounds for these bookings. The price you accept is fixed: EGYPTIA does not increase it because its own costs rise or because it misjudged a cost. A change that you ask for after booking, such as extra nights, is a new request with its own price (section 9).

6. Payment

6.1 Deposit

The deposit is 25% of the total price of the booking. It must be paid in money; Reward credits can never pay or reduce the deposit. The deposit is due within ten days of your acceptance, by 11:59 pm Cairo time on the last day, unless our team gives your booking a different deadline, which will then be shown in your account. Your place is secured only when the deposit has arrived and has been verified (section 3).

6.2 Balance

The remaining 75% is due 60 days before the first day of the tour, when EGYPTIA sends you the balance request. You will see the amount and the date in your account, and we send you reminders before the date. Reward credits may be used towards the balance within the limits of the Rewards Terms.

6.3 Bookings close to departure

If you book 60 days or fewer before departure, or if the balance date of your booking would fall before the deposit deadline, the full price (100%) is due at once, within the deadline shown in your account.

6.4 How to pay

All payments are made by bank transfer to EGYPTIA’s account at CIB, in USD or EUR, using the bank details shown in your account. Please write your booking reference in the transfer message, so that we can match your payment quickly, and upload the bank’s receipt in your account. Our team then checks the transfer in the bank. Each bank transaction reference is counted once only. A receipt is evidence that you sent a transfer; a payment counts as received only when the money has arrived in our account and has been verified.

6.5 Bank fees and shortfalls

The sender pays their own bank’s fees, and any intermediary or currency-conversion charges made on the way, so that the amount due arrives in full. If less arrives than is due, the difference remains payable and is shown in your account. It must be paid before departure, or, only if our team expressly approves it, in USD or EUR on arrival in Egypt. Approval to pay a difference on arrival is an exception for that amount only and does not change the other payment dates.

6.6 Late payment

We send reminders before each payment date and tell you if a deadline has passed. Nothing is cancelled automatically: our team first checks the bank, because money that arrived in time always counts, and then contacts you about the booking; we may give you a new deadline. Until a deposit has arrived and been verified, no place is held for you (section 3).

7. If EGYPTIA cancels

We plan every departure carefully, and we may still need to cancel a booking or a departure, for example for operational reasons, for your safety, or because of events outside our reasonable control. If EGYPTIA cancels a booking or a departure, we refund all money you paid for it, without any cancellation fee, by bank transfer in the currency you paid. Reward credits used on the booking are returned to your wallet. We may offer you an alternative date, journey or arrangement by message; you are free to accept it or to keep your refund, and an alternative is never forced on you instead of money. If the law gives you further rights in such a case, those rights apply as well.

8. Travellers’ details, passports, visas and insurance

8.1 Details after booking

After booking, each traveller’s details are added in your account: the name exactly as in the passport, gender and date of birth as in the passport, nationality, passport number and expiry date, a clear photo or scan of the passport’s photo page, whether a local SIM card is needed, any optional activities, dietary notes and, if the traveller wishes, health or mobility notes. An emergency contact who is not travelling with you is also required. You can fill in what you have and save it, and complete the rest later; your account shows clearly what is complete and what is still missing.

8.2 Deadline

All traveller details are due 45 days before the first day of the tour. If a passport is not ready yet, for example because it is being renewed, choose “passport not ready yet” in your account and give the date you expect it; your booking stays open, and you add the passport details as soon as you have them.

8.3 Passports and entry

Each traveller’s passport must be valid for at least six months after the end of the trip, subject to the entry rules that actually apply to that traveller, which can differ by nationality and may change. Each traveller is responsible for holding a valid passport and for obtaining any visa and entry documents they need, unless EGYPTIA has expressly agreed in writing to provide a specific visa service. Please check the current requirements with the relevant embassy or official source before you travel. EGYPTIA cannot be responsible for a refusal of travel or entry caused by missing or invalid documents.

8.4 Travel companions

The lead traveller can invite the other adult travellers to the booking with a personal link, which is valid for 14 days. A companion who joins can add their own details and may pay their share of the balance into the booking. The lead traveller remains responsible for the booking as a whole, including for any amount that a companion does not pay.

8.5 Insurance

Travel insurance is recommended for every traveller, covering at least medical treatment, repatriation, cancellation and personal belongings. It is not a condition of booking, and a booking is never refused because a traveller has no insurance.

9. Changes you ask for

9.1 Names and details

Until and including day 30 before departure, a traveller can correct their own name, and change the other details they have given, in their account, free of charge and without approval. From day 29 before departure, the names and the details already given are fixed, because the rooming list and the information for our hotels, transport and other suppliers are being prepared; the name-edit option disappears, and there is no route for requesting a name change. A detail that is still missing, such as a passport that was not ready, can still be added. Days are counted as calendar days in Cairo time. Our team may always correct an obvious error.

9.2 Travel date

A change of travel date is not a change to the existing booking: it means cancelling the booking, with the cancellation fee that applies under the Cancellation and Refund Policy, and making a new booking on the new date, at that date’s availability and price.

9.3 Rooms, extra nights and other additions

Within the room types of your booking, you may rearrange who shares which room, until the rooming list is fixed. Extra nights before or after the tour, and other additions, are a request: we reply with a price and the arrangement, and they become part of your booking only once you accept them. The price of your booking does not change unless you accept such an addition.

10. EGYPTIA Rewards and how we contact you

Reward credits are governed by the Rewards Terms, which form part of your agreement whenever you earn or use credits. In summary: after a completed trip you earn five credits for each USD or EUR 1 of money actually paid; 100 credits are worth one USD or EUR on an eligible booking; credits can pay up to 20% of a booking, only on the balance and never on the deposit; the money paid with credits earns no further credits; and all credits expire after 12 months without a completed trip, a completed referral or a use of credits. Credits are not money and cannot be withdrawn, sold or transferred.

Email is our main channel for everything about your booking, and each message also appears in your account. We send WhatsApp messages about your trip only if you have agreed to receive them, and you can stop them at any time in your account. News about our journeys is sent only if you separately ask for it, and it is never required to book.

11. Health, accessibility and safety

Our journeys involve travel, walking at archaeological sites with uneven ground and steps, long road journeys on some routes, heat, and, on some tours, boats or desert outings. Before you book, please tell us about any mobility, health, dietary or other needs that may affect the trip, so that we can tell you honestly whether and how they can be met. We check each request against the tour and our suppliers. A specific arrangement becomes part of your booking only when we have confirmed it in writing.

Every traveller must follow the law of Egypt and the reasonable safety instructions of our guides, drivers and suppliers. Serious unsafe, abusive or unlawful behaviour that endangers or seriously disturbs others may lead to a proportionate measure, including removal from an activity or a service where this is lawful and reasonably necessary. The financial consequences of such a measure depend on the circumstances and on your mandatory rights.

12. Suppliers, changes and events outside our control

Hotels, transport, domestic flights, cruises, guides, attractions and activities may be provided by independent suppliers chosen by us. EGYPTIA’s responsibility towards you is set by your booking and by the law; the fact that a service is performed by a supplier does not by itself remove that responsibility. We may make a minor operational change where it is reasonably necessary, for example a change in the order of visits, a change of guide, vehicle or comparable hotel, or a change of timing caused by opening hours or traffic, and we will tell you about it when we can.

If we need to make a significant change to an essential part of your booking, or if an event outside reasonable control affects your journey, such as severe weather, natural events, health emergencies, unrest, decisions of authorities, or the closure of a site, we will explain the situation, the choices open to you and the remedies that the contract and the law give you. Such events do not automatically remove your right to a refund or to assistance where the law provides it.

13. Problems during your trip and complaints

If something is not as it should be during your trip, please tell your guide or our team as soon as reasonably possible, through “Report a problem” in your account or at info@egyptiatours.com, so that we have the chance to put it right on the spot; many problems can be solved quickly when we know about them. Each report receives a reference, and our answer appears in your account. If you are not satisfied with how a problem was handled, you can send a formal complaint to info@egyptiatours.com, and we aim to give you a substantive first answer within 15 working days. A delay in reporting does not remove a right that cannot be waived, but reporting promptly makes it much easier for us to help.

14. Liability

EGYPTIA is responsible for providing the services of your booking with reasonable skill and care. Where the law allows a contractual limit, our total liability for a booking is limited to the money paid to EGYPTIA for that booking, and we are not liable for indirect or consequential losses that were not reasonably foreseeable when the booking was made. These limits never apply where the law does not permit them, including liability for death or personal injury caused by our negligence, or liability that cannot be excluded or limited by law. Where you cause loss or damage, for example to a hotel room or a vehicle, or incur a fine through your own conduct, you are responsible for it to the extent the law allows.

15. Governing law and disputes

These terms and every booking are governed by the laws of the Arab Republic of Egypt. Disputes are submitted to the competent courts of Egypt. This choice does not take away the protection of mandatory consumer rules of the country where you live, where those rules apply to you, nor your right to bring a claim before another court that is competent under such rules. We always prefer to resolve a disagreement by talking to you first.

16. Your booking agreement, records and policy versions

Your booking agreement consists of the tour description and itinerary as accepted, your choice of rooms and hotel level, the inclusions and exclusions, the exact price, your booking confirmation, these Booking Terms and the Cancellation and Refund Policy in the versions you accepted, and any written arrangement we have confirmed. We keep a record of the agreement: the versions of the policies you accepted, your account and booking, the time of acceptance, and the IP address and browser used.

We may update our policies from time to time. A new version applies to bookings that accept it; a booking keeps the versions it accepted, unless the law requires otherwise or we both validly agree to a change. The current versions are always published on our website, with their version number.