The Wall Street Journal
By Jack Nicas
Dec. 26, 2013 1:51 p.m. ET
Amid the craziness of holiday travel, some customers scored a big win on Thursday when they found incredibly low fares on Delta Air Lines Inc.'s website.
Delta said the fares—which included round-trip, cross-country flights for $25—were errors. But the airline said it would honor the fares.
The glitch, which appeared around 10 a.m. EST, caused some domestic flights to be offered for below $5, not including taxes and fees, according to Delta.com screenshots from Airfarewatchdog.com, which tracks airline pricing.
It appears Delta then took down its website to prevent more fliers from booking the erroneous fares. The website was back up by midday Thursday and a Delta spokesman said the glitch has been resolved.
Tazmun Nahar, who runs skiplagged.com, which tracks airfares, said she received an alert about the cheap fares Thursday morning. "So then we did some quality assurance" to confirm the fares, she said. "And we couldn't believe our eyes."
She quickly booked a $25 round-trip flight between New York and Seattle and three round-trip seats between New York and Los Angeles for $75 total. "Isn't that insane?" she said.
United Continental Holdings Inc. experienced a similar error earlier this year when it offered mistake fares—including some that were virtually free not including taxes and fees. In that case, United also honored the mistaken fares.
George Hobica, founder of Airfarewatchdog.com, said some airlines have language in their booking contracts that allows them to not honor fares posted by mistake. "But they do honor them typically," he said.
Source: http://online.wsj.com
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