We only list local agencies that employ their own guides. Most of the applications we turn down come from intermediaries: an outfit that takes the booking, keeps a margin, and hands the walking to whoever is available that week — so nobody is accountable for the guide who actually shows up on the ground. We refuse that model every time. We only list the agency that employs the guide, pays the muleteers, and answers the phone when the weather changes the plan.
The seven criteria
Every one is checked before an agency is listed.
Licence
A current Ministère du Tourisme licence, in the agency's own name — not a third party's. The number is published on their profile.
Insurance
Civil liability and mountain rescue cover for every traveller, on every departure. We require it of every agency we list.
Own guides, not brokers
The guides are employed or contracted directly by the agency, certified, and named on the trip. Agencies that subcontract the walking to whoever is available aren't listed.
Fluent French and English
Not the office — the guide who will be with you on the ground, for days at a time. We check this at interview.
Same-day response, tested before signing
We test this before listing an agency: an unannounced request has to get a reply the same working day, in the traveller's language. It's a condition of entry, not an option.
Three years operating, at minimum
Long enough to have handled a bad season, an incident, and a cancellation. We ask the agency to walk us through all three.
Signed code of conduct
The five commitments below, signed by the owner, with pay rates disclosed to us in writing.
The code of conduct
Five points, signed by every agency.
Guide and muleteer pay: above the regional minimum, paid in full on the last day of the trip, disclosed to us in writing.
Group caps: twelve travellers per guide on valley routes, eight above 3,000 m, six on winter ascents. No exceptions for a larger booking.
Animal welfare: load limits respected, mules rested and watered on schedule, no animal worked on consecutive multi-day trips.
Waste: everything carried in is carried out, including grey water, away from watercourses. Nothing burned, nothing buried.
Cultural conduct: no photographing someone without asking, no entering a home uninvited, purchases at local prices, Ramadan observed on the trail.
Removal
What gets an agency removed
Subcontracting a trip to another operator without telling the traveller.
A guide, muleteer, or cook paid below the rate the agency signed.
A group run over the cap, or a winter ascent run without the right equipment.
A safety incident concealed from us, or a rescue we hear about from the traveller first.
A licence or insurance certificate that lapses and isn't renewed.
Removal is immediate and we don't negotiate it. We tell the travellers affected, we find them another agency, and we say why.