Source: The Guardian
For Tariq Khan* and his family, the pilgrimage to Mecca should have been the trip of a lifetime. But after paying more than £16,000 to make the hajj they found themselves sharing a hotel bedroom with strangers and having to use squalid toilets and kitchens .
The family, from Rochdale in Greater Manchester, are among the latest group of people to return from the hajj complaining that they have been ripped-off by one of the many unscrupulous travel agents that appear to prey on the UK’s Muslim community.
Pilgrimage to Mecca is a mandatory duty that has to be carried out at least once by all Muslims who are physically able and have the financial means to undertake the journey.
Up to 25,000 British Muslims travel for hajj each year, spending an estimated £125m. Pilgrims save for years to finance the typical three-week trip. The Khan family spent £4,000 a head to go to Saudi Arabia last month. But, despite assurances that they would have a room to themselves, they say that when they arrived in Mecca they were separated into their different genders and forced to share very poor rooms with strangers – including one decrepit bathroom between eight people.
Khalid Pervez, who runs the Association of British Hujjaj (Pilgrims) UK, a charity set up to improve the experience, says many of those making the trip are being denied the basic consumer and travel protections to which they are entitled – and that the authorities have shown little interest in tackling the problem.
“While the visit will often be one of the spiritual highlights of the pilgrim’s life, the travel and accommodation is frequently appalling and, in many cases, downright dangerous. Tales of shockingly bad hotels, decrepit buses and terrible flight choices that require long waits at foreign airports are all too common among returning pilgrims. It’s not what they were sold, and in any other case it would be considered a scandal.”
He says many returning victims fail to complain because, often, they are unaware of their rights, but also because travel agents manage to convince them that it will somehow “cheapen” the hajj experience.
In 2015 an investigation by Birmingham Trading Standards into 182 Mecca-related tour businesses across the UK found that 147 were not complying with the relevant legislation. At the time 129 businesses were issued letters of warning and trader notices by the authority. It was also stated that formal enforcement action was undertaken in 17 cases.
Categories: Hajj, Saudi Arabia, The Muslim Times
During my Hajj ten years ago I also had disappointing accommodation in Makkah. I was told that the ‘VIP’ accomodation refers to the short distance to the mosque and not the quality of the room. Anyway the pleasure of the Haj made us forget the minor inconvenience. (I did not pay as much as stated in this article)