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British Airways has reportedly “declined to honour US-India round-trip fares of $40 to $100 that were posted by mistake” earlier this month.

Published: 12 Oct 2009

British Airways has reportedly “declined to honour US-India round-trip fares of $40 to $100 that were posted by mistake” earlier this month.

According to a posting on The Los Angeles Times travel blog, in an e-mail to travel agents, the airline said “it would offer a $300 discount on a future flight to people who snagged the cheap fares”.

According to the same publication, in its e-mail to travel agents, British Airways apologised 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.

The offer came after the U.S. Department of Transportation said it was investigating the incident.

A spokeswoman for BA, according to TimesOnline, said the problem arose when it tried to increase the fares in question by $40. Somewhere along the line a ‘plus’ sign got eliminated when the new information was being entered. Although BA became aware of the error immediately, it took two hours to correct information on its website, according to the report.

“On Monday we cancelled the bookings because these fares were so clearly below the normal price,” the spokeswoman said, adding that the company was still not sure how many $40 tickets had been sold.

Some customers pointed out that the $40 fare tag is misleading. “What they’re leaving out is that taxes and fees amount to $530+. So sure it is a good deal, but not a give-away by any means,” one buyer said. Others said they paid between $600 to $700 including taxes, fees, and surcharge, and insist BA should honour the deal.