An airline mistake fare is a ticket that is currently being sold for a significantly lower price than it is usually sold for. The reason for the low price is due to an error made by the online travel agency or the airline itself.
Mistake fares can happen because of several different reasons, such as currency exchange rate errors, computer glitches, or human error. Learn more about exactly what a flight mistake fare is.
There are only 2 ways that you can get mistake airfare – either search for the mistakes yourself or hire a company to do it for you.
1) Find Mistake Fares On Your Own
I don’t recommend searching for airline mistake fares by yourself. Why not? Because it would be ultra time-consuming! The fastest and easiest way to find a mistake fare is to pay a small fee to a mistake fare company, and they will find many mistake fares and email them to you for a fee.
But if you want to find mistake fares on your own, here’s how:
Follow Travel Blogs and Forums
There are social media accounts that share mistake fares publicly. You must refresh their feed multiple times every day to see if they have posted anything new.
There are several websites and blogs that often share mistake fares to the public, in the same way as the social media accounts.
Some of these sites have chat forums where you can talk to other like-minded individuals who are interested in finding cheap airfare, just like you.
Some of these sites have dedicated sections specifically for mistake fares. Here are some examples:
- The Flight Deal
- Secret Flying
- FlyerTalk
- Airfarewatchdog
- Mighty Travels
Use Price Comparison Tools
Price comparison tools like Google Flights, Skyscanner, and Kayak allow you to search for flights to specific destinations, monitor prices over time, or set alerts for price drops. You can use these tools daily to increase your chances of finding a mistake fare.
Search for Flights to Specific Destinations:
You should start by searching for flights to the destination you’re interested in. Then use the search filters to set your travel dates and other preferences. You might get lucky and find an abnormally cheap price.
Monitor Prices Over Time:
If you find a flight that you’re interested in, use the price comparison tool to monitor prices over time. There is usually an area to set up alerts so that you’ll be notified if the price drops. This usually requires you to enter your email address or phone number. You will be notified every time the price fluctuates.
Look for Sudden Price Drops:
If you don’t want to give your email or phone number to a random online website, then you must return every day and check for price drops.
If you do this, I highly recommend that you use a VPN to search for cheap airline tickets to prevent tracking and being taken advantage of by dynamic pricing.
Check Airline Websites Directly:
Some mistake fares happen on the website of the airline. And because some of those flights are not advertised through third-party booking sites, you will not find them on the major sites, such as Kayak or Google.
Sometimes airlines do this to save money. This way, they don’t have to pay commission fees to the travel agencies. So it’s a good idea to check the website of each individual airline to check for deals.
Are you starting to see how time consuming this is?
2) Pay a Company to Find Mistake Fares For You
Like I mentioned above, finding mistake fares on your own takes a lot of time, effort, and energy. And even if you spend all of that time searching, you may not even find one at all!
It is so much easier to join the mailing list of a mistake fare company and let them do all of the work for you. Joining their email list is so simple.
How To Receive Mistake Fare Notifications:
- Visit a Mistake Fare Website
- Enter Your Email
- Choose an Airport
- Start Receiving Notifications
- Book It!
It’s literally that simple.
Remember, mistake fares are mainly created by currency conversion errors, technical glitches, fuel surcharge errors, coding errors, or human errors – and these mistake fare companies are highly trained in finding them.
Most of these companies have algorithms built into their own servers that scour the internet for these deals. When they find them, they simply email them to you.
You could probably sit on your computer from sunup to sundown, and not be able to find anywhere close to the amount that these companies find everyday.
So, like I said, I highly recommend that you get on their email list just to get familiar with how it works.
Generally, mistake fares are difficult to find on your own, but if you do, the savings are usually unbelievable! Buying a mistake fare is arguably the best way to get cheap airline tickets!
Considering that most people save over $500 per international economy class ticket, paying a reasonable fee to join their mailing list is totally worth it.
Tips For After Finding Mistake Airfare
Be flexible with your travel plans:
Sometimes mistake fares are happen to flights that are at awkward times or have slightly long layovers. If you are flexible with your plans, and you don’t need to have a direct flight, there is a better chance that you will save more money – as mentioned here in this article about using long layovers to save money on flights.
Act quickly:
Mistake fares do not last very long. Either someone else sees it and purchases it, or the website notices the mistake fare and corrects the price very quickly. Sometimes the price is corrected only after just a couple of hours, and other times it will disappear after a couple of days.
Don’t call the airline to ask if it is a mistake or not:
Simply book it and hope for the best. If you do call them, they may tell you that you’re not allowed to book it because it was a mistake. It’s usually better to simply book it and hope the airline doesn’t notice.
Remember, always have a plan B just in case the airline notices the mistake after you book it. In that case, they will either ask you to pay the real price, or, simply cancel the booking and refund your money.
