Q. In early September, I saw a good deal on a round-trip fare from San Francisco to Palau, in the South Pacific, on Korean Air. I booked two tickets for February — one for me, one for my girlfriend — for $510 apiece. In the weeks that followed, we booked hotels and planned activities, and I bought an underwater camera. We were looking forward to a great vacation.
But on Nov. 7 — a full 64 days after our initial reservations — Korean Air e-mailed to say that our tickets had been canceled.
“At the beginning of September, an erroneous fare was briefly published for travel on Korean Air from North America to Palau,” the e-mail read. “We regret to inform you that Korean Air is unable to honor this erroneous fare for travel and has canceled all tickets, including yours.”
We were offered a refund for the tickets and other “travel related” expenses, as well as a $200 voucher to be used on Korean Air flights. It also offered to book the same seats at the best price for the itinerary in the past year. With that $200 voucher, this basically amounted to an added charge of about $360 a ticket, or a 70 percent increase. We think that Korean Air’s offer is inadequate. Quite simply, at the price it now wants us to pay, we would not have booked this trip. Meantime, we’ve passed up other options and Korean Air has had our money for three months.
What’s troubling is that this “mistake” fare was up on a travel site for at least four days. I know because we slept on it before booking, and over the next couple of days tried to persuade our friends to come with us. Then there’s this question: Why did it take Korean Air two months to figure out that it had posted an erroneous fare? The cynic in me thinks that Korean figured that the longer it waited to cancel our tickets, the more likely we’d be to cough up an additional $360.
Christopher Schneider
Austin, Tex.
A. The Haggler received a handful of e-mails that told essentially the same story, in the course of about three days. This seemed a strange coincidence until a bit of Googling revealed that an oddly named blog, “Leighrowan’s Posterous,” had posted a terrific tirade about this fare mix-up. It ended with a “media tool kit” that urged those affected to write mature but adamant letters: “Use spell-check, write clearly, use as few words as possible and make your point as quickly as possible.”
Oh, Leighrowan Posterous — that is poetry! Haggler correspondents, please memorize that sentence.
The Haggler’s e-mail address was one of several media contacts listed, which explained the sudden influx. Leighrowan speculated that “300+” people had been affected, though exactly how that number was derived was unclear. What is certain is that “the Palau 300” sounds better than “the Palau 300+.” Leighrowan, as well as others on different blogs, claimed that what Korean Air had done was A.) post a fare intended only for travel agents, and B.) totally bogus.
Several bloggers and commenters made the point that airlines charge hefty fees whenever passengers alter booked tickets. So “why should an airline be allowed to unilaterally cancel valid tickets because it’s no longer in their best interest to honor them?” asked Brian Kelly, who blogs as the Points Guy. “I understand this may be legally allowed via the contract of carriage that they created, but it still doesn’t make it right.”
The Haggler was soon e-mailing with Penny Pfaelzer, a publicist for Korean Air. She forwarded a response that basically outlined the offer that Mr. Schneider had detailed above. Plus this: “Korean Air’s ultimate goal is always customer satisfaction, and we have paid great attention to making sure our passengers are dealt with fairly. While we regret that the above arrangements might not be acceptable to everyone, it is our hope that they will be acceptable to most of our affected passengers.”
The Haggler then forwarded to Ms. Pfaelzer another e-mail from another member of the Palau 300, Spencer Fox. He unfavorably compared Korean Air’s response to that of British Airways when it found itself in a similar pickle in 2009. The company posted United States-to-India fares for $40, though only for a few minutes. When the fares lingered for two hours on a few travel Web sites, about 1,200 people pounced. British Airways quickly canceled the tickets and coughed up $300 vouchers for everyone. It later offered to cover travel-related costs, like cancellation fees.
It seems that Korean Air was working from the British Airways playbook, but as Mr. Fox noted, the Palau fare was not a self-evident error. Yes, $510 for a round-trip ticket to the South Pacific is very cheap, but not what you’d call obvious-error cheap. And Korean Air took far longer to cancel and make amends.
Let’s just say that none of Mr. Fox’s arguments moved the suits at Korean Air. Ms. Pfaelzer forwarded another e-mail stating that the company wouldn’t customize a solution for travelers who didn’t like the original offer.
“The airline acknowledges that there will be passengers who will be unhappy with the outcome,” the e-mail said. “But it also feels it has done everything it can do create a fair and equitable solution.”
The deal on the table seemed, after this correspondence, like the company’s final offer. Until Mr. Schneider wrote last week to say that he’d recently called Korean Air and that it had quoted him a price that would cost him an additional $200, instead of an additional $360. He says he has still not decided whether to take the offer.
“Better, but not ideal,” he wrote.
E-mail: haggler@nytimes.com. Keep it brief and family-friendly, and go easy on the caps-lock key. Letters may be edited for clarity and length.
Article source: http://feeds.nytimes.com/click.phdo?i=10f52c17f6d8dc7ef5ae5bd67bfe7aaf
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