Cathay Pacific accidentally sells $16,000 premium tickets for $675

Mistake comes after data breach at Asia's biggest international airline

Cathay Pacific makes a ticketing blunder on premium fares. Reuters

Asia's biggest international airline Cathay Pacific accidentally sold premium tickets at a fraction of their price but plans to honour the discounts.

The Hong Kong-based company sold business-class return tickets from Vietnam to destinations in the US and Canada at deeply discounted prices, according to bloggers.

A premium round-trip ticket from Da Nang, Vietnam to New York is a steal at $675, according to Gary Leff, a travel blogger on View from the Wing. A return trip from Hanoi to Vancouver in first-class will cost $988, according to travel blog One Mile at a Time.

A business-class return ticket to New York from Da Nang costs around $16,000 for travel in July and September, according Cathay’s website on Wednesday.

Cathay Pacific referred The National to its tweet when asked for comment about the discounted fares.

The pricing mistake adds to the company's woes, as it grapples with a turnaround to reverse losses amid fierce competition from Asian budget airlines.

This gaffe comes after the airline's computer system was hacked last year, exposing the personal data of more than 9 million customers in the industry's biggest airline data breach.

Pricing mistakes sometimes happen at airlines due to human or technical issues in the computer system or from currency conversion errors.

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Other airlines have made similar pricing errors. Singapore Airlines in 2014 and Hong Kong Airlines last year honoured business-class tickets mistakenly sold at economy fares. They did not disclose how many people purchased the cheaper tickets.