United Offers Discount 'Apology Fares'
But there's a catch
Travelers this summer can hop a flight to Paris for as little as $433 or to Trinidad and Tobago for just $274. The catch? Those discount fares are on United, which has received more than its share of bad press this spring: first, by denying seats to two women flying while wearing leggings, and then two weeks later, by forcibly removing passenger David Dao from an overbooked flight.
"Since the incident on United 3411, there's been a noticeable drop in United's fares," Scott Keyes, who founded and runs Scott's Cheap Flights, explains to Travel + Leisure. "I'm not privy to United's internal numbers, but whatever drop in bookings they were seeing must have scared them enough to slash prices."
Keyes has dubbed these low-price tickets "apology fares." Many of them are close to half as cheap as typical fares, and some, like a $200 flight from New York to Mexico City, are even less than half the norm. But will travelers take them? That remains to be seen. There's also no word on how long the discount fares will be on the market, so those who want to catch them should book soon.