I wrote about North Korean state airline Air Koryo at least as far back as 2007.
They first introduced online booking to their website about a year and a half ago, and it’s a good thing they did!
My favorite thing about Air Koryo is that the communist state airline offers more than one class of service.
Lucky loves that they will sell you up to five extra seats if you are fat (even though they don’t have more than 3 seats in a row).
In the comments to his post, it was pointed out that their online booking tool has a mistake fare!
Now, Air Koryo doesn’t publish its fares through the traditional distribution systems. Search for fares on this route, I don’t come up with the mistake.
ITA Software doesn’t find any service on the route either, since it can’t access Air Koryo’s schedules.
Fortunately the Air Koryo booking tool is robust. And I come up with the fare right away!
Oddly I wonder if the price isn’t zero but actually negative $1. There seems to be an online booking fee (Air Koryo taking commercial cues from Spirit Airlines?). But the total price comes out $1 below the booking fee amount.
Get ’em while they’re hot, people! But bear in mind that travel to and from North Korea on this fare may not be treated kindly by @KimJongNumberUn.
Now, a good fare to fly on Kim Jong Un’s private jet on the other hand… That’s certain death.
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Somehow, I think this is one mistake fare I’ll pass on.
Now how do i get to Vladivostok? 🙂
@frank
funny you ask.. i just booked a ticket from a friend using 10k avios! NRT-VVO on S7.
im booking this mistake fare rite meow
..make that 7,500 BA avios.
the airkoryo website is still “processing my request” 5 minutes later. think ill go to the store for a while & check
It seems like other routes are available at the mistake rate, I was able to price out PEK to FNJ at $9 USD.
@Mike, yep — roundtrip in business class even!
I know this is nice but I don’t know why people haven’t realised it doesn’t work?! Literally, it gets hung up on the booking page before you give CC info.
Not sure whether this is a joke or it’s serious, but either way I think the risks are incredibly high, and not just the risk of a fare not being honored.
@DaveS exactly. Even if it’s not honoured (presuming someone actually get’s it to work!), if you actually ever want to visit the DPRK you better not mess around with this fare. If you do go, I don’t think this will be taken to lightly.
Yes, to paraphrase Yakov Smirnov: “In Pyong Yang, mistake fare book YOU!”
Just booked my flight. About negative 2,000% change I ever get on this flight. I would rather pluck my finger nails out of my fingers with my teeth than get on this airlines, let alone visit this country.
@LarryInNYC I nearly ruined my keyboard.
@antigos
Apparently Air Koryo is a halfway decent airline, but I tend to share your sentiment about actually visiting the country.
Closest I ever got was the DMZ outside of Seoul. Good enough for me.
It’s not everyone’s cup of tea, but DPRK is easily the most interesting country I’ve been to so far. As far as Air Koryo, I found it to be a better experience than any US domestic coach flight I’ve ever taken, but I guess that’s not saying much.
I would never have guessed that MikeOwave and Dan. Learn something new every day!