Recently, United Airlines experienced a glitch that caused tickets to be $0-$10. They are unsure of how many tickets were actually sold, but the airline company decided to not request actual payment for those tickets because the people who bought then didn't know that it was a glitch and thought it was real.
I thought that this story was kind of hilarious. My dad travels for a living, so I know how expensive airline tickets can be, and the thought of getting a ticket for less than $10 is wishful thinking. I wish I had bought one of those tickets!
This article is interesting, though. Because you would think that the airline company would request the money back. I think it was very honorable of them to stand by what they said rather than be stingy and request it back when it was their fault.
That brings up another question I had: Was it really their fault? When you think about it, something like that could be seen as a practical joke for hackers. It reminds me of the time when some MIT kids hacked into whatever their train system in Boston is and made it to where they could get tickets with hundreds of dollars for only a nickel. I wonder if it was really a glitch, or if it was hacked.
Either way, it's good that the company did not force them to pay full price. That will probably get them more customers just because they were honorable.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-24089326
It is very nice to see a company honoring the prices these tickets sold for. I hope it was simply a glitch. I'd like to think that people wouldn't hack into the system like this, but it may have happened anyway.
ReplyDeleteClever title! I too am impressed that the airlines showed such integrity. I tend to suspect that the system was hacked, because surely a big company would check the prices before publishing them.
ReplyDeleteI think it was best for the airlines to leave the situation of the low cost tickets alone. After all, no one gets to travel to places for the price of $10. If only $10 tickets existed.
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