Last night, we posted an incredible mistake fare from the Maldives to New York for just $101 one-way or $142 round trip. You could fly with stopovers for a bit more or to many European destinations for about $65. The catch was whether or not Emirates would honor this incredible fare.
At the time, we urged readers to wait before making any additional bookings as this seemed unlikely to be honored. This morning, a reader tweeted the following, which gave me some hope for the folks who had booked it:
I had been closely eyeing Flyertalk and Twitter for news today. Unfortunately, the word is in: Emirates is cancelling these mistake fare tickets. Several readers have commented on last night’s post to share that news and there are many similar reports in the Flyertalk thread. They aren’t pulling any punches — one Flyertalk user confirms that the reason given for cancellation was that the fare was an error:
Is there any chance to fight this?
While some will surely attempt to file DOT complaints, recent precedent has held that the DOT will rule in favor of the airlines in these cases where the price is obviously lower than normal. Personally, I don’t find it to be worth pursuing these for the infinitesimally small chance that you receive some sort of compensation. I view mistake fares like refundable lottery tickets: if I lose, I get my money back. If I win, I get the jackpot. I know that there is another lottery around the corner and I’m likely to win on these tickets more often than the ones at the gas station. And so I’d play on for a win on another day if I had one of these bookings.
It’s disappointing, but we figured this had a relatively low chance of being honored from the get-go. At least they handled this one promptly — they could have waited a month and just quietly cancelled tickets (note: Matthew has posted several updates on that situation, but I believe to no avail). We will continue to bring you the best deals we find — and hopefully we’ll all win the jackpot on the next one.
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[…] also to many additional cities, so we posted an update. In our subsequent post asking “Will Emirates Honor the Maldives mistake fare?“, I said that I view mistake fares like refundable lottery tickets: if I lose, I get my […]
I just got the below email:
On 17 May 2017, a number of tickets for Emirates flights originating in Male, Maldives were shown as available for purchase online with a wrong value fare. This was due to an error in the uploading of fares into the online reservation system, whereby the fare was incorrectly filed in the wrong currency. Tickets issued in error during this time were suspended, and corresponding bookings automatically cancelled.
Your booking was one of those affected.
Acting in the best interest of our customers, Emirates has made the decision to honour the fare. Therefore your booking has been reinstated. We will send you the new e-ticket receipt shortly.
If you wish to change the original booking, the original ticket will be refunded and a new ticket at the applicable fare will have to be issued.
If you have decided not to continue with your flight and have already paid for the booking, you can avail of a full refund of the fare and taxes paid. You can live chat with us if you have any query via http://www.emirates.com/livechat
We apologise for the inconvenience this may have caused, and would like to assure you that Emirates remains committed to providing our customers with excellent service and a strong value-for-money proposition.
Thank you for choosing Emirates.
Kind regards
The Emirates Team
The DOT ruling doesn’t care about the wording in bloggers’ posts. T says if the fare is reasonably too low, then it doesn’t have to be honored.
The real question is… if a company chooses to evoque that right and cancel the ticket, but then reinstate it, are they then admitting it wasn’t a mistake or that it wasn’t a burden on them? If they are, then it takes away their initial right to cancel the tickets and puts the premise of the DOT rule into question.
It is entirely false to claim the DOT does not care about what bloggers post. See, in particular, the first two paragraphs under “Mitigation” (beginning page two) of the DOT’s ruling in American’s favor on November 5th 2015 – https://www.transportation.gov/sites/dot.gov/files/docs/eo_2015-11-3.pdf.
I read what’s under “Mitigation” and it’s American Airlines’ claims. Did you read the findings right below that? The DOT dismissed American’s claims and ordered them to honor the mistake fares.
It pays to read things through before arguing.
I was wrong in stating the DOT ruled in American’s favor in that case. I apologise for that. I do, however, wholeheartedly stand by my statement that bloggers’ posts (being “social media sites”) are taken into consideration by the DOT. If that were not the case the DOT would surely not have dedicated an entire page to that aspect of American’s argument in their ruling in this case.
[…] the rules of the country and the airline, they don’t always have to honor this fare. Blogger, Nick Reyes, summed up error fares pretty well: “I view mistake fares like refundable lottery tickets: if […]
Zozeppelin is spot on. Bloggers who use the words “error” and “mistake” make a rod for their readers’ backs. It’s naive and shows a total lack of understanding of more receny DOT decisions in such cases.
Booked on Priceline .. received a note of cancellation a few days ago, with no refund. After seeing the posts above (and still receiving the error when attempting to Manage Booking/etc.), I reached out via chat to Emirates service. Within a minute the itinerary was ‘re-activated’. No mention of erroneous issue/cancellation/etc. Incredible.
I can view my itinerary againbut no e-mail from Emirates. Can anyone confirm if e-tix are RE-issued or do we just stick to original ones?
Also, I get the following error when trying to pick seats (I had them picked before it was cancelled)
“Preseating has been closed for this flight. You will be able to select seats using the online check-in facility 48 hours before the flight.”
Has anyone been able to successfully pick seats?
Why don’t you just call reservations and have them assign seats and send you another email? From what I understand, the original tickets with original ticket numbers and original PNR code have been re-established, but call the to confirm.
Just did that. Figured they would be overwhelmed but there was no wait. She confirmed and picked my seats. Cant believe EK came through, given their history of not honoring!
Got the call from Emirates this morning. They are reinstating all the tickets they cancelled. Call their reservations to have them reinstated. Unfortunately, relying on their cancellation, we had purchased tickets on Qatar instead and spent MUCH more. I called and complained on the Emirates website, but knowing them, they will do absolutely nothing. Reinstating these tickets put them into an unprecedented position because those who relied on their actions and booked more expensive alternatives are out of a significant amount of money while the company, by reinstating the tickets, is accepting that they’re entitled to the flights booked. In short, if they don’t compensate the passengers, it’s a breach of contract and possibly fraud. I await their response and added the US DOT to my favorites on the browser. I suggest all those who are in a similar situation, complain as well. At least demand vouchers for future flights.
I got another confirmation email from Emirates this morning, with the same PNR.
I guess Emirates decided to honor this error.
Time to book hotels and positioning flights.
BREAKING NEWS FOR ME BOYS AND GIRLS!!!!!!!
sorry for the capitals I’m screaming in joy 😀 😀
My bookings are back and furthermore I received a new ticket from EK and an email stating that THEY WILL HONOUR THE FARE!!!!
So Miami… el papi chulo is in da’house!!!! Travel plans begins in 3..2..1..
Here is the email I received:
———————————————-
Dear Mr. el papi chulo,
On 17 May 2017, a number of tickets for Emirates flights originating in Male, Maldives were shown as available for purchase online with a wrong value fare. This was due to an error in the uploading of fares into the online reservation system, whereby the fare was incorrectly filed in the wrong currency. Tickets issued in error during this time were suspended, and corresponding bookings automatically cancelled.
Your booking was one of those affected.
Acting in the best interest of our customers, Emirates has made the decision to honour the fare. Therefore your booking has been reinstated. We will send you the new e-ticket receipt shortly.
If you wish to change the original booking, the original ticket will be refunded and a new ticket at the applicable fare will have to be issued.
If you have decided not to continue with your flight and have already paid for the booking, you can avail of a full refund of the fare and taxes paid. You can live chat with us if you have any query via http://www.emirates.com/livechat
We apologise for the inconvenience this may have caused, and would like to assure you that Emirates remains committed to providing our customers with excellent service and a strong value-for-money proposition.
Thank you for choosing Emirates.
Kind regards
The Emirates Team
——————————————————–
Thanks everyone in this post for the support. I have really gave up on these tickets and decided to do my final google-fu and found this blog.
Hopes up everyone… you’re going to the US!!!!
Got some great news as well! I booked directly with Emirates. For those that booked, it’s a win/win. If we ever decide to cancel prior to the trip, they will offer us the full refund! Here is my chat log with Emirates.
Transcript:
00:00:01 J : EMIRATES.COM Error code : [Live Chat – On Load] Custom Message : [ – Emirates ]
00:00:17 Katsiaryna : Hi J
00:00:22 Katsiaryna : How can I help?
00:00:49 J : Hello. My booking was cancelled due to a mistake fare by Emirates.
00:01:22 J : Please look into this.
00:01:40 Katsiaryna : Sorry about that.
00:02:07 Katsiaryna : I’m working on it
00:02:14 J : thanks.
00:05:04 Katsiaryna : I’m working on it
00:05:30 J : sure. Thank you.
00:17:44 Katsiaryna : J, thanks for waiting
00:17:56 Katsiaryna : Can I send you tickets to your email?
00:18:14 J : yes. so will the tickets be issued?
00:18:26 Katsiaryna : I just reissued tickets
00:18:47 J : wow great! so they are for two tickets correct?
00:19:05 Katsiaryna : Sure for 2 passengers
00:20:46 Katsiaryna : I have just sent 2 tickets to your email
00:21:27 J : wow. Thank you so much!
00:21:39 J : so can you tell me what happened initially?
00:22:34 Katsiaryna : It was a technical error on the website
00:22:44 Katsiaryna : Is there anything else I can help?
00:23:52 J : ah I see… I wish I was notified because I had to make additional changes regarding my trip. If I need to cancel in the future, am I eligible for a full refund?
00:29:00 Katsiaryna : If your decide not to continue with flight and have already paid for the booking you can available of full refund of the
fare and taxes paid
00:29:36 J : That’s good news. If I do decide to cancel, can I do it through this chat?
00:30:30 Katsiaryna : Yes,You can do it via the chat
00:30:44 J : thank you. you have been very helpful today. I hope you have a great day.
00:31:08 Katsiaryna : You’re most welcome. Thanks for contacting Emirates chat. Have a nice day!
Emirates is honoring this fare! Just got an email explaining the mistake and saying the ticket has been reinstated. WOOOOO!!!!!
This is crazy, I gave up on these tickets! Now they are confirmed. Mark, where did you book your tickets? Just curious if there is something in common between the tickets that are confirmed.
I booked directly on Emirates.com. I had also given up on them but had been too busy to call emirates to demand a refund.
I booked direct and my flight is still canceled.
Oops, pulled up the wrong one.
My mistake. I pulled up my other reservation and it is BACK! The last segment (on Alaska) is listed as “Waitlist”. Weird.
i just checked and I’m still seeing the error message!
I just spoke to a rep who said that it was cancelled but i asked her to check with her supervisor and she came back saying that indeed, they just received a circulation this morning informing them to honor the fare but that she had to reissue it which is why I was still getting the error msg online. I had her reissue while on the phone and I’ve already received a confirmation msg and Voila!, it’s back on their website once again. The seats appear to be closed for reservation however when earlier it was possible to choose your seats as well. Anyways, I’m not complaining!!!
I also can enter my confirmation number and it shows confirmed. I booked direct.