British Airways offers $300 to fliers who booked mistaken $40-$100 fares to India
British Airways, which declined to honor U.S.-India round-trip fares of $40 to $100 that were posted by mistake a week ago, is now making nice with customers. In an e-mail to travel agents today, the struggling airline said it would offer a $300 discount on a future flight to people who snagged the cheap fares. But it still didn’t say it would honor the fares, which it planned to refund to buyers.
The offer came after the U.S. Department of Transportation said it was investigating the incident, which has unleashed a barrage of criticism in Internet chat rooms on sites such as FlyerTalk and in comments posted on my earlier post. A DOT spokeswoman declined to elaborate on the investigation.
Some people who bought the low fares on Oct. 2 said they had thought they were valid because, with taxes and fees, they could total more than $500. Others worried that the mistake could wind up costing them hundreds.
“On the same day, I found a ticket for $1050 (round trip),” said “Pradeep,” who posted a comment on my blog. “However I found this one (i.e $650) relatively cheaper and booked with Orbitz.com….Now I lost both the deals and can’t find a ticket for less than $1700.”
In its e-mail to travel agents, British Airways apologized for the error and said customers who booked the fares could get $300 off “any published retail World Traveller fare from the US to India when booked between now and Nov. 12, 2009.” It said the offer was valid for travel through Sept. 30, 2010.
To take advantage of the offer, customers should “contact BA directly at 1-800-247-9297,” it said. That’s not a special line, just the airline’s regular number, judging from the automated menu I got when I called.
How did the mistake occur? When I last spoke with British Airways, they said that in filing for a $40 fare increase, the “plus” sign got dropped in computer systems and that the low fares were available for about two hours. It wasn’t clear how many hundreds or thousands of customers might have been affected.
—Jane Engle, assistant Los Angeles Times Travel editor
Photo: British Airways jets at London’s Heathrow airport. Credit: Mark Lennihan/Associated Press
11 Comments on “British Airways offers $300 to fliers who booked mistaken $40-$100 fares to India”
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October 10th, 2009 at 11:40 am
British Airways should honor the commitment. There have been mistakes like this in the past by other airlines and hotels and they’ve been honored. What, they are too cheap???
October 10th, 2009 at 9:18 pm
Offered and accepted. Increasingly, with errors like these (all computer glitches are really man-made), we see the erosion of contracts law. Does a different law of contracts apply to the internet? If so, the booming business on the internet is at risk. Is there a lawyer out there who would like to opine?
October 11th, 2009 at 4:54 am
I booked the BA flight for IAD-DELHI return $569 for my son a student at george mason fairfax through ORBITZ.
Even i filled up the passport and Green Card detail of son after feu hours of booking on airline site.My son received confrmation mail from British Airways,Orbitz and Ameidus with seat nos.
My credit card was kept under authorization for four days after booking.
But now airline says it will not honour the booking,first i was told booking is cancelled due to nonavailbilty of seats inspite of seat nos allotted already.
It is totally UNFAIR.
October 12th, 2009 at 1:00 am
I booked ticket to Hyderabad for 627 dollars and i checked my status in British airways website and found that is valid so i called my parents rose up their hopes that i am coming in December and after seven days when i called Orbitz they said it was an error….I don’t understand how this system works…if i didn’t check with orbitz what would have been my case? i came to know my tickets got cancelled on Wednesday through mail…i still have my hopes on that British Airways would honor the tickets or else i definitely say i would never trust any deal from British Airways
October 12th, 2009 at 5:44 am
After a busy week, I wanted to finalize my India Trip. I browed the web and there were fairs from Air France which takes me to my destination Bangalore and back. for $1220.00 When I searched on Kayak I got this deal of $617.00!!!!I grabbed the deal. Just a few months back my son travelled to the same place for $1005.00 by Delta.When these Airlines hike up prices on demand and make money it was not surprizing to me about this offer. I got the e-ticket confirmation and now they call me that my ticket has been cancelled by B.A. It is not fair!!!!
DOT should insist that they should honor their offer and advise them to be careful when they display their fairs in future to avoid the kind of disappointments to customers and embarassment to the travel websites
October 12th, 2009 at 10:12 am
British Airways should honor the contract. If this was a hedging contract for fuel or something like that involving big guys they would be honoring the deal on the pain of being dealt justice.
The sop of 300 dollars is meaningless because it merely gives a discount from undiscounted fares set by British Airways itself–not to any airline’s fares.
And what about incidental and consequential damages? This is no act of God. Given the opaque nature of airfares, why do they expect ordinary travelers to have notice of corporate intent?
October 12th, 2009 at 5:34 pm
we have booked these fares as well through Orbitz. They denied and worng doing and said it was fault of British Airways. We called BA and they said it was the fault of Orbitz. Now both are offering vouchers which means they are admitting fault and wrong doing which should make a stronger case for us for them to honor these itineraries. Do not use your voucher until they honor these itineraries - if you use voucher you will be considered compensated!
October 14th, 2009 at 9:28 am
Darek makes a good point. By using the voucher, I imagine you may eliminate your options in seeking reinstatement of your original ticket.
The other issue is whether or not the voucher is even valuable at all. In my case, it is worse than worthless - it would actually cost me more money to use it on a British Airways flight than to fly another airline without the voucher.
October 14th, 2009 at 11:54 pm
Hey guys
Can somebody please update whats going on with BA now with those tickets?
October 20th, 2009 at 8:01 pm
Just got off the line with BA about my cancelled trip, which has now almost tripled in price. And was spoken to very rudely, denied contact with a supervisor. I simply only requested if maybe they could prorate the $300 to anywhere they service, so that perhaps it would make some kind of dent in a feasable airfare. Nope, not even empathy or a sincere apology. I’m in the travel industry and will now advise my clients to book Virgin, Lufthansa, Swiss, Emirates, or ANY airline other than BA. I can’t believe they don’t even have a special customer complaint department about this. Jerry, a res agent from BA, said that “everyone should have known better than to book a $40 fare which was obviously not real.” Yes, I knew better (being in the industry and had a feeling this would happen), but what about people who don’t travel as often or at all? Are they supposed to just “know” about airfares and how they work? Absolutely not! BA just called us all stupid on the phone, I guess.
October 25th, 2009 at 6:45 am
I am one of those folks who booked with British Airways on October 2, 2009. They cancelled my booking and still have not refunded my credit card with the amount of the ticket. I had to put a stop payment on the credit card but I need for them to refund my money or I will have to pay interest on it even though I’m not benefiting from it. What is happening with this? I need to make a complaint to the relevant body!