Can foreigners book hotels in India through Booking.com, or do some hotels only accept Indian residents?

Later the same traveler booked another hotel in Mathura: Booking.com sent a confirmation, but the hotel wrote that this was not a guarantee and asked for a partial payment via UPI with a receipt. When she replied that she could only pay by card through Booking.com or would cancel, the hotel told her to pay on arrival.

Participants' advice on payment: never pay the hotel directly in advance — pay only through Booking.com or on arrival.

In August 2026 a traveler booked and paid for a hotel in Mathura via Booking.com. When she messaged the hotel on WhatsApp to ask about leaving luggage after check-out, she was told she could not stay there at all because she was not an Indian resident. She only found out by chance, not at the booking stage.

One participant suspected the hotel of trying to scam her: in his view, Booking.com is an international platform where hotels able to host foreigners are usually listed, while Indians tend to book through local apps. He advises forwarding the hotel's message to Booking.com support and letting them deal with it.

Another traveler wrote that he never had problems with hotels in India booked through Booking.com, while acknowledging that such cases can happen.

Another participant disagreed: everyone books through Booking.com, Indians included. If a guesthouse's reviews are written only by Indian guests, she says, that is a reason to wonder whether it is licensed to host foreigners.

Another traveler said she was refused check-in several times on pay-at-property bookings, even though nobody had warned her in advance that foreigners were not accepted. The hotel usually found another place for her to stay, and in Dehradun it even paid for a taxi to the new hotel and apologised profusely.