This Airline’s Blunder Sold $10,000 Asia-US Business Class Tickets For $300

Several passengers were able to secure tickets worth $10,000 (Rs 8.2 lakh) for only $300 (approx ₹ 24,000) after a Japanese airline unintentionally underpriced some business class tickets, according to a report in the New York Post.

One of Japan’s biggest airlines, All Nippon Airways (ANA), a 5-star airline since 2013, offered inaccurate costs for tickets to fly from Indonesia’s capital Jakarta to Japan, then to New York and back to Singapore and Bali. Interestingly, one flier paid just $890 (Rs 73,000) for a first-class ticket from Jakarta to the Caribbean via Tokyo and New York and back again.

The 9,000-mile flight would cost less fortunate passengers “around 20 times as much for a first-class seat”, as per NYP.

According to the outlet, other consumers purchased business-class tickets for a few hundred dollars, as compared to the regular $10,000 price. It is to be noted that business class tickets on the airline typically cost between $8,300 (Rs 6.8 lakh) and $10,400 (Rs 8.5 lakh) but were listed for ranging from $300 to $550 (Rs 45,000).

Johnny Wong, an airline employee, told Bloomberg that he paid $550 for a round-trip business class ticket from Jakarta to Honolulu. As per the outlet, the price of the flight is now $8,200 (Rs 6.7 lakh).

According to ANA, the issue occurred owing to a glitch on their Vietnam website, which featured an incorrect currency conversion.

The airline has not disclosed how many individuals were able to purchase cheap tickets, but said that it is “investigating the cause of the bug and the extent of its damage”.

The airline intends to make a decision by the end of the month, but discounted tickets purchased to be used before May will be honoured, according to an AMA official.