Thirty Pilgrims. One Hotel Block. Zero Chasing.
Group Umrah looks simple from the outside and is not. Someone at the mosque volunteers to organise it, and three weeks later they are holding a spreadsheet of passport numbers, chasing deposits over text message, and discovering that the airfare they saw in October no longer exists.
Umrah Packages Canada is a TICO-registered Umrah specialist based in Toronto, Ontario, with 20+ years of Umrah and Hajj coordination experience, and our group Umrah packages exist to take that entire load off the organiser. We lock bulk airfare into Jeddah while it is available, hold a hotel block near the Masjid al-Haram so the congregation stays in one property, file every pilgrim’s Umrah visa individually as a Nusuk eVisa through the Ministry of Hajj and Umrah portal, arrange dedicated air-conditioned ground transportation across Saudi Arabia, and run a pre-departure seminar at your centre. Each traveller’s deposit is held and protected by us under Ontario’s Travel Industry Act rather than sitting in the organiser’s personal account.
Ten to thirty pilgrims is the range we work in most often. Mosque committees in Scarborough, Mississauga, and Springdale in Brampton make up the largest share, alongside Islamic centres in Cote-des-Neiges in Montreal, Mill Woods in Edmonton, and Surrey in British Columbia. Sisters-only groups, multi-generation family blocks, and youth groups travelling over the December school break all book through the same process. If you are comparing group Umrah packages near you, the departure airport matters more than the office address: we run groups from every city we serve.
What Changes When an Imam or Scholar Leads Your Umrah Group?
A group travelling with an imam or a visiting scholar is a different trip from a group travelling alone, and the itinerary should reflect that.
Ritual walk-throughs are the most practical difference. For first-timers, having someone explain Tawaf around the Kaaba and Sa’i between Safa and Marwah on site, in their own language, removes a layer of anxiety that no written guide fully solves. Teaching sessions in the evening, held in the hotel rather than at the Haram, give the group somewhere to put their questions.
The scheduling implication is that the day cannot be packed. We build in space around the teaching rather than stacking Ziyarat excursions against it. In Madinah that means visits to Quba Mosque, Mount Uhud, and the Seven Mosques are timed around the scholar’s lessons rather than a fixed tour script. If your scholar has a fixed schedule, send it to us at quote stage and the itinerary is built around it.
Where a group does not have a scholar travelling, the pre-departure seminar carries more weight, which is why we run it in person rather than sending a PDF.
Keeping Your Congregation in One Makkah Hotel Is a Booking Decision
The most common failure in group Umrah is the congregation ending up in three different hotels, one of them twenty minutes further from the Haram than the others.
That is not bad luck. It is what happens when a block is requested late. A group of twenty-five needs a genuine allocation held against dates, and in peak windows that allocation is committed months out. We hold it early at properties such as Nawazi Watheer, Elaf Bakkah, or Swissotel Al Maqam, where Platinum rooms in the Clock Tower complex look onto the Kaaba, and if the group grows we extend the block rather than placing latecomers elsewhere.
The same logic applies to airfare. Bulk group locks exist while seats do; once a Ramadan or December departure fills, the group gets split across routings and arrives in pieces. Ramadan groups feel this most, since a 7-night Ramadan package runs $2,041 to $2,247 CAD per person with flights and inventory near the Haram closes first. Everything about group travel works better when the booking is early, and everything degrades when it is late.
Ground transportation inside Saudi Arabia is dedicated to your group rather than shared: the coach meets the group at King Abdulaziz International Airport in Jeddah, runs the Jeddah to Makkah transfer, and handles the Madinah leg unless the group takes the Haramain High-Speed Railway. For a party of twenty-five moving between Makkah and Madinah with luggage, that is not a luxury, it is the only arrangement that functions.
Who Should Hold the Deposits? Why TICO Protection Beats the Organiser’s Account
Community organisers regularly ask whether they should collect deposits and forward one payment. The answer is no, and it is worth being blunt about why.
An individual holding thirty people’s deposits carries personal exposure for something that should sit with a registered operator. If a traveller withdraws, if a price changes, if a family needs to pay in stages, the organiser ends up mediating a financial dispute inside their own congregation.
As a TICO-registered Ontario travel agency, UPC handles each pilgrim as an individual booking, with their own deposit, their own protection under the Travel Industry Act, and their own written itemised quote. The organiser coordinates people, which is the part they are actually good at, and we coordinate the money and the contracts.
It also means each pilgrim gets their own Umrah visa application rather than being bundled into a batch. One incomplete file then delays one person instead of the whole departure.
| What a group organiser is comparing | Typical Provider | Umrah Packages Canada |
|---|---|---|
| Who holds the deposits | Organiser collects and forwards one payment | Each pilgrim pays directly, TICO protected under the Travel Industry Act |
| Visa filing | Batch application for the group | Individual Nusuk eVisa per pilgrim, PR card holders included |
| Hotel allocation | Rooms assigned as available | Single-property block held early and extended if the group grows |
| Group pricing | Quote first, price later | $750 to $3,299 CAD per person published, itemised quote within 4 business hours |
| Pre-departure preparation | Emailed information pack | In-person seminar at your mosque four to six weeks out |
How a Canadian Mosque Group Departure Works: Quote, Umrah Visas, Seminar, Jeddah
It starts with a conversation with one or two people from a committee. Numbers, rough dates, which airport, whether an imam is travelling, and how many first-timers are in the party.
From that the UPC team quotes per person across the tiers, since groups are rarely uniform. Some pilgrims take a 4-star room and some want the Clock Tower complex, and a mixed-tier group is entirely workable as long as everyone shares the itinerary and the coach.
Once numbers firm up we lock airfare on Emirates, Turkish Airlines, Qatar Airways, Saudia, or Air Canada, hold the hotel block, and open individual Umrah visa files, with Canadian PR card holders covered on the same terms as citizens (see our Umrah visa guide for Canada). The pre-departure seminar happens four to six weeks out, at your centre, covering rites, Ihram and the Miqat, arrival at Jeddah, health and vaccination requirements, travel medical insurance, and what to do if someone becomes separated at the Haram.
Then the group travels with dedicated ground transport, a held block, and a single point of contact for the duration.
Five Price Factors. Group Umrah Packages From $750 to $3,299 CAD.
Occupancy. Quad rooms carry the lowest per-person rate, which is why larger families inside a group pay less per head than couples.
Airfare leverage. A locked bulk fare for twenty-five travellers prices differently from twenty-five individual bookings, particularly outside peak windows.
Tier. The 2026 published range runs $750 CAD for group economy land-only to $3,299 CAD for a Platinum Haram-front block.
Season. Ramadan and December carry the same premiums for groups as for individuals, 15 to 20 percent in Ramadan, and the inventory pressure is worse.
Child pricing. Discounts apply on most tiers and are quoted per child rather than assumed.
Send your numbers and your window, and the written itemised quote comes back per person in Canadian dollars within four business hours. If your group is travelling in a peak month, look at Ramadan departures and start earlier than feels necessary. Committees planning a Hajj group instead work on a separate quota and timeline, covered under our Hajj packages.
