Sorry about your experience, it sounds truly horrible. The article on this site was updated back in 2019 clearly stating that Ecuador no longer offers visa on arrival, so I’m not sure why you’re saying the article is out of date. The update is right at the top: https://bkpk.me/ecuador-visa-for-indians-and-anyone-else/

Unfortunately when visa on arrival provisions get abused by people looking to immigrate illegally (of course, not you..) the country ends up taking a hard line stance. It must have been awful to go through that experience in immigration detention.

I’m an Indian citizen living in United States for past 18 years as a physician. I’m currently on H1B visa. I’m a travel enthusiast and have visited about 30 countries. Ecuador esp Galapagos was on my bucket list and wanted to visit with my family (wife and son who are US citizens). So, I did my research and most sites and travel agent noted that they provide Visa on arrival provided all documents were with me (pass port, financial statements, travel insurance, return ticket and a fully booked itenary). Given that I have visited many other countries that provided me visa on arrival, I went ahead and booked the expensive trip. When I arrived at the immigration at Quito, I was greeted by a very impolite agent who basically told me bluntly that my wife and son will get entry and I will be removed from the country immediately. She wasn’t willing to listen to anything including all the information on the internet and detained me in a small room with bunk beds with no bedsheets and torn beds. She said I wasn’t allowed to leave that room until I board return flight. Delta airlines that I flew in was of NO help. During the night I saw another Philipino citizen who was also subject to removal for the same reason. He was on his honeymoon with his US citizen wife. Again, No consideration whatso ever regarding separating family and kids. The agents were absolutely apathetic about our plight. Given that it was a weekend there was no supervisor in the area, neither were they willing to make an attempt to get hold of him/ her to even try helping us.

After spending overnight in detention, and upon my insistence,there was a supervisor, who spoke decent English, that spoke to me over phone and basically said it is not his responsibility and I’m ‘NOT WELCOME’ to Ecuador. After 16 hrs of painful detention with rude, U.N. empathetic Ecuadorian agents who treated me like a criminal, I got on flight to come back to US and left my family to continue as there didn’t seem to be any scope for refunds. They didn’t provide water, food during detention.

I found out that they forced the philipino citizen on his honeymoon to return to US too

The moral of the story is even though Ecuador might be a beautiful country, they WILL NOT allow anyone (Indian and philipino) to enter without a VISA stamp in pass port. THERE IS NO ‘Visa on arrival’. And, based on their behavior, you are on your own if you end up in trouble there. Unhelpful and not friendly
From what I gathered after this, Seems like they DO NOT WANT INDIAN TOURISTs coming in as they made visa process exceedingly difficult. I just don’t want anyone else falling into expensive trap like I did

Thanks.