How to cancel
Message us on WhatsApp or email hello@balloonflightmarrakech.com with your booking reference, at least 24 hours before your scheduled flight.
Why a clear cancellation policy matters more than it might seem
A booking policy is one of the few parts of choosing an activity you can fully research before committing any money, which makes it a genuinely useful signal about how an operator treats customers more broadly. An operator confident in their service tends to offer straightforward, generous terms because they don't need small print to protect against a flood of cancellations — cancellations happen at a fairly consistent, low rate regardless of how strict or lenient the policy is, since most people book activities they actually intend to attend. A confusing or restrictive policy, on the other hand, is sometimes a sign of an operator more focused on protecting revenue than on the customer experience, which is worth factoring in alongside price when comparing options across the operators you're considering for your trip.
What counts as "cancelling" versus "rescheduling"
These are handled differently, so it's worth knowing the distinction. A cancellation ends the booking and triggers a refund under the terms below. A reschedule keeps your payment in place and simply moves it to a new date — this is almost always the better option if your travel dates have shifted rather than fallen through entirely, since it avoids any processing delay associated with a refund.
Deposit vs. full payment
If you paid a 20% deposit, cancelling before the 24-hour window returns the full deposit. If you paid 100% upfront, the same rule applies to the full amount — cancellations inside 24 hours are handled case by case, since a slot may have been reserved specifically for your group.
How long a refund actually takes
Refunds to PayPal or card are typically processed within a few business days of confirming the cancellation, though your bank or card provider's own processing time can add a little on top. Refunds for Moroccan bank transfers are handled directly with our team over WhatsApp to confirm the receiving account details.
Rescheduling instead of cancelling
If your travel dates shift, ask about moving your flight to a new date instead of cancelling outright — this is usually possible at no extra charge, subject to availability. This is also the standard outcome if a flight is called off for unsafe weather rather than a cancellation you initiate yourself.
Weather is different
Cancellations caused by unsafe weather are not subject to the 24-hour rule and are always fully refunded or rebooked — see our weather cancellation policy for the complete process.
What if I need to cancel because of illness or an emergency?
Message us as soon as you know, even if it's inside the 24-hour window — we handle genuine emergencies on a case-by-case basis rather than applying the standard policy mechanically. Documentation isn't required, but the earlier you let us know, the more flexibility we have to work with your specific situation, whether that means a full refund, a rebooking for later in your trip, or a rebooking for a future visit to Marrakech entirely.
Does the cancellation policy differ by tier?
No — the same 24-hour window and refund terms apply whether you've booked Classic, Private or Royal. The only practical difference is that Private and Royal bookings sometimes involve reserving a specific balloon slot further in advance, which is one more reason to give as much notice as possible if your plans change. If in doubt about which category your situation falls into, message us on WhatsApp and we'll clarify before you need to make a final decision — it costs nothing to ask, and it's far easier to resolve a question in advance than to sort out a misunderstanding after the fact. Our team typically replies within minutes during normal daytime hours in Morocco.
Why 24 hours, specifically?
This window exists because a booking slot — particularly for Private and Royal flights, which reserve an entire balloon rather than a shared seat — represents a real commitment on the operator's side. A pilot and ground crew plan their morning around confirmed bookings, and very short-notice cancellations make it difficult to fill that slot with another guest. Twenty-four hours strikes a balance: enough notice for the operator to potentially rebook the space, while still being flexible enough to accommodate genuine last-minute changes in your own travel plans.
What "inside the 24-hour window" actually looks like in practice
If your flight is scheduled for 6am Thursday and you contact us at 5pm Wednesday, that's inside the 24-hour window and handled case-by-case rather than under the automatic full-refund policy. If you contact us at 3pm Wednesday for a 6am Thursday flight, that's comfortably outside the window and processed as a standard cancellation. When a request falls right at the edge, we err on the side of the customer rather than counting minutes strictly — the 24-hour rule exists to prevent last-minute no-shows from costing the operator a filled slot, not to penalise borderline cases.
Partial cancellations for group bookings
If your group size changes — say, two people out of six can no longer join — message us as early as possible so we can adjust the booking rather than treating it as a full cancellation. For Classic flights, this simply means updating the passenger count and the corresponding charge. For Private or Royal flights, since you're paying per person for a reserved basket rather than individual seats, a reduced headcount may affect the per-person rate depending on how far in advance the change is made; we'll always confirm the adjusted total before charging anything further.
Cancelling after paying the full amount versus a deposit
The refund mechanics are identical regardless of which payment option you originally chose — a full-amount cancellation before the 24-hour window returns the entire sum, just as a deposit-only cancellation returns the entire deposit. Guests sometimes assume paying in full removes flexibility compared to a deposit, but this isn't the case: the 24-hour cancellation window applies equally either way, and the amount refunded simply scales to what was actually paid.
What information we need to process a cancellation quickly
To avoid any back-and-forth, include your booking reference (sent in your confirmation message), the name the booking was made under, and your preferred outcome — full refund or rebooking to a new date — in your first message. This lets us process the request in one exchange rather than several, which matters most if you're contacting us close to the 24-hour cutoff and want confirmation before that window closes.
Does the payment method affect how a refund is issued?
In every case, refunds are returned via the same method you paid with — a PayPal or card payment is refunded back to that PayPal account or card, and a Moroccan bank transfer is refunded via a return transfer to the account it came from. We don't offer store credit or an alternative payment method for refunds; you always get your original payment method credited, which is both simpler to track and more transparent than a voucher-based system.
Rebooking to a different tier, not just a different date
If your plans change enough that you'd now prefer a different tier rather than simply a different date — say, upgrading from Classic to Private after deciding you'd rather not share a basket — this is usually possible as part of the same rebooking conversation, with the price difference settled at that point. It's simpler to raise this when you first get in touch about changing your booking rather than cancelling and rebooking as two separate transactions.
What happens if we need to cancel on our end
Beyond weather, on rare occasions an operator may need to cancel for a mechanical or logistical reason unrelated to weather — equipment maintenance discovered at the last minute, for example. In this scenario, exactly the same terms apply as a weather cancellation: full refund or free rebooking, with no cost to you regardless of how much notice we're able to give. This is treated identically to a weather cancellation precisely because neither is something you have any control over or responsibility for.
Common questions about the policy, answered briefly
- Can I cancel by phone instead of WhatsApp or email? WhatsApp and email give us a written record of your request and reference number, which is why we ask for those specifically, but a phone call followed by a quick WhatsApp confirmation works just as well.
- Is there a cancellation fee? No — outside the 24-hour window, the full amount paid is refunded with no deduction.
- Can I cancel more than once (cancel, rebook, then cancel again)? Yes, the same policy applies each time; there's no limit on how many times you can adjust a booking, though very frequent changes are worth discussing directly with us to keep things straightforward.
How this compares to typical tour operator cancellation policies
Many tour and activity bookings — city tours, day trips, cooking classes — often carry stricter cancellation windows, sometimes 48 or 72 hours, or tiered refund percentages that shrink the closer you get to the activity date. A flat 24-hour full-refund window is on the more generous end of what's typical in the Marrakech tourism market, reflecting both the relatively simple logistics of rebooking a balloon slot (compared to, say, a multi-stop guided tour with pre-booked entry tickets) and a straightforward preference for policies that are easy to explain and honour rather than ones with confusing sliding scales.
What happens to the WhatsApp and email notifications sent to our team
When you submit a booking through our site, an automatic notification reaches our team by both WhatsApp and email within moments, and the same happens when you request a cancellation or reschedule. This dual-channel approach exists specifically so a request doesn't sit unread if one channel is checked less frequently on a given day — a practical detail that matters most when you're trying to get a cancellation processed close to the 24-hour cutoff and want confirmation it's actually been received.
If you booked through a marketplace instead of directly with us
This policy describes cancellations for flights booked directly through Ochre & Sky. If you booked the same flight through Viator, GetYourGuide or a similar platform, your cancellation request and refund process go through that platform's own system rather than directly with us, and their specific terms may differ slightly from what's described here — always check the cancellation terms shown at the time of booking on whichever platform you used. This is one of the practical differences covered in more depth in our direct booking vs. marketplace comparison.
Documenting your cancellation for your own records
Once a cancellation or refund is confirmed, we send written confirmation by email or WhatsApp — it's worth keeping this message until the refund actually appears in your account, particularly for bank transfers or PayPal refunds that can take a few business days to process on the receiving end. If a refund hasn't appeared after a reasonable processing window, having that original confirmation message ready makes it much faster to follow up, whether with us or with your bank or card provider. This is a small habit worth building for any online booking, not just this one, since payment disputes are almost always resolved faster with clear written evidence in hand, and it costs nothing to simply keep a screenshot or forward the confirmation to your own inbox for safekeeping.
The bottom line
Free cancellation up to 24 hours before departure, full refund via your original payment method, no fees, and a straightforward process that takes one message to start — that's the entire policy in practice. The only real nuance worth remembering is the distinction between a standard cancellation (subject to the 24-hour window) and a weather-related one (never subject to it, since that's entirely outside your control) — see our separate weather cancellation policy for that specific scenario.