Key takeaways
- Model the network as a hierarchy: a Master that owns inventory, Resellers that build their own networks, and Agents that sell to pilgrims.
- Let each tier earn only by marking up the price it receives, and never let a tier see the margins above it.
- Keep each agent's bookings, prices and notes private from other agents, even when they serve the same pilgrim.
- Permissions should cascade downward: a parent sets the ceiling for everyone beneath it.
In markets such as Bangladesh, Pakistan, Indonesia and India, a large share of Umrah pilgrims book through a local agent they know personally, who in turn buys from a larger operator. That operator may hold the relationship with the Saudi Umrah company and the hotel blocks. The network is the distribution channel, and for many operators it is the business.
Scaling that network is mostly a question of structure: who can sell what, at what price, who can see which data, and how money moves back up the chain.
A three-tier model that matches how the trade works
| Tier | Who they are | What they control |
|---|---|---|
| Master | The principal operator or wholesaler, often the party contracted with a Saudi Umrah company. | Inventory, packages, departures, supplier costs, base pricing, and the whole network below it. |
| Reseller | A regional partner or large agency that recruits and manages its own agents. | Its own agents, its own markup, its own branding, within the limits set by the Master. |
| Agent | The local travel agent who knows the pilgrims. | Customer relationships, bookings and document collection for its own pilgrims. |
The important property is that Resellers can grow their own Agent networks. A single B2B agreement with a strong regional partner can turn into dozens of points of sale without the Master onboarding each one.
Stacked markup: how every tier earns
The cleanest commercial model is stacked markup. The Master sets a net price for each Reseller. The Reseller adds its markup and hands a net price to its Agents. The Agent adds its own markup and sells to the pilgrim. Two rules make this work:
- No tier sells below the floor it inherited. An agent can discount its own margin, not the Reseller's or the Master's.
- Each tier sees only the cost handed to it. Upstream margins stay confidential, which removes most of the friction in B2B negotiations.
Settlement then follows the same structure: the pilgrim pays the Agent, the Agent settles its net price with the Reseller, and the Reseller settles with the Master. Keeping these as separate ledgers, rather than one blended account, is what makes month-end reconciliation possible.
Data privacy between agents is not optional
Pilgrims shop around. The same person may enquire with two agents in the same network. If both agents can see each other's quotes, notes and prices for that pilgrim, you have created a conflict inside your own channel. The right model is shared identity and private commerce: the pilgrim's passport identity can be recognised across the network to avoid duplicates, but each agent's bookings, prices and notes stay visible only to that agent and the tiers above it.
Between different Masters, the separation must be absolute. One operator's inventory, pilgrims and finances should never be reachable from another operator's account, and that isolation needs to be enforced in the database and application layers, not just hidden in the user interface.
Permissions that cascade downward
Each tier should decide what the tier below it may do: which modules it can use, whether it can create bookings or only quotations, whether it can see supplier names, whether it can issue refunds. A parent's settings act as a ceiling. If the Master narrows a Reseller's permissions, every Agent under that Reseller is narrowed automatically. When a relationship ends, suspending the parent should freeze its entire sub-tree while preserving history for audit.
White-labelling: let partners sell under their own brand
Resellers and agents invest in their local brand. They are far more likely to adopt a shared platform if their customers see their logo, not yours. White-label support on a shared platform, resolved automatically at login, gives partners that without the cost of a separate deployment for each of them.
Credit, deposits and risk
B2B distribution is also a credit business. Before scaling a network, decide:
- which partners can book on credit and up to what exposure;
- which bookings require a deposit before hotel or visa commitments are made on the pilgrim's behalf;
- what happens to a partner's open bookings if they fall behind on settlement.
These rules are easy to agree in a meeting and hard to enforce by hand in peak season. They belong in the system.
Onboarding partners without losing control
The fastest-growing networks make onboarding boring: a standard permission template per partner type, a standard markup range, training material for the booking flow, and a clear route for document collection. Agents at the edge of the network collect most passports, so give them good tools for scanning and uploading documents, and keep verification and visa decisions with the tier that carries the regulatory responsibility.
How UmrahCore models a B2B network
UmrahCore is built around this exact Master → Reseller → Agent hierarchy. Each Master is a sealed tenant with hard isolation at the database and application layers, sibling privacy keeps agents' bookings and prices apart for the same pilgrim, permission ceilings cascade downward, and every Reseller and Agent can apply its own white-label branding. The three-ledger finance model separates pilgrim receivables, inter-tier settlement and supplier payables.
Frequently asked questions
What is a B2B Umrah agent network?
It is a distribution model where a principal operator sells Umrah packages through resellers and local agents, each adding its own margin, rather than selling only directly to pilgrims.
How do sub-agents earn in a stacked markup model?
Each tier receives a net price from the tier above and adds its own markup. It cannot sell below the price it inherited and cannot see the margins of the tiers above it.
Should agents in the same network see each other's bookings?
No. A pilgrim's identity can be shared to avoid duplicate records, but each agent's bookings, prices and notes should remain private to that agent and the tiers above it.