Error fare flights are indeed magical for anyone who manages to fly on one. A bit like having a winning ticket. As the name sugguest though, finding an error fare is not easy due to mistakes being corrected as soon as they are found.

There is no happier feeling than receiving an error fare alert to a destination that is on your bucket list. Having said that your only true way of ever finding one is through an error fare alert company. That does imply that any cheap flight price alert company could help but we feel Bobs flight alerts have all the right tools and systems in place to give you your best chance.

What are these Error Fares? (I hear you say!)

There are many factors that can cause a Mistake Fare.

Human error: The most common cause of airline Mistake Fares is human error. This is due to a loading error from a database consultant. ATPCO is probably the source of these error fares, due to them loading data for both the Airlines and Online Travel Agents (OTA) on a number of different Global Disruption Systems (GDS).

Airlines owns technology: The airlines can sometimes make mistakes with their tax amounts. This is due to each flight an airline takes usually requiring a tax and fuel surcharge to pay. For example Finnair offered a London Heathrow to Los Angeles in premium economy for £342 due to the wrong fuel surcharge amount added for a premium economy route.

School holiday mistake fares: There are two reasons this may happen. An incorrect travel period is added to a low season fare. For example, Summer in the UK is normally the most expensive time to fly. An error fare here will be that July or August (high) would have been added to a January (low) flight price. The second one is related to the booking class that is used to hold the airline seats. The mistake fare here is caused by an airline loading a booking class for a low price and adding it to the high price class. Example, would be Easter is normally a cheaper time to fly, what makes this period expensive is that the classes sell out quickly but if the airline adds the same lower price to a higher price class you get a really good school holiday fare.

Here are some Error Fares:
London to Narita ££289 roundtrip
Glasgow to Calgary £147 roundtrip
London to California LAX/SFO £268 summer dates roundtrip
Inverness to Toronto £161 roundtrip
Cardiff to Johannesburg £378 Christmas dates roundtrip
Around the World (4 stops) £468 roundtrip

How long do Mistake Fares last?

Because error fares are not that common and the savings can be massive, they typically don’t last long. Most often just a few hours, a day at most.

What should I do if I find a Mistake Fare?

No matter whether we find you a Mistake Fare or you are sent a price alert from Google flights or Skyscanner our preferred advice is to book directly with the airline. The airlines normally honour their prices booked online due to not wanting bad publicity on social media. Nevertheless, if you are shown the error fare and decide to book it through an online travel agent (OTA), they could call within 24 hours to either cancel or upsell the cost. Most of the time the OTA errors are caused by the GDS (see above about tech errors) and are honoured.

What precautions should I take when booking an Error Fare?

We recommend waiting around two weeks before making any non-refundable plans such as hotel accommodations or tours, in case the airline or online travel agent cancels your ticket. Airlines cannot turn around and charge you more but of course, can cancel your ticket and tell you the fare has gone up. Your options then will be to either to accept or agree to a refund.