Shanghai Couple's 7,304-Yuan Flights Vanish as Travel IDs Turn Them into Children

A Shanghai couple said their 7,304-yuan (US$1,017) flight booking disappeared after a ticket agent changed both passengers' birth years to 2011, turning the adults into apparent minors in the travel system, Shanghai Morning Post reported today.

The couple, identified by the husband's surname Su, had bought two tickets from Shanghai to Lhasa through the Qunar travel platform. When they arrived at the airport, staff could not find valid tickets for them. A check found that Su, who was born in 1994, and his wife, who was born in 2000, had both been assigned the 2011 birth year. The final digit of their identity numbers was also incorrect.

Qunar customer service told Su that the tickets could not be used because of an operating error by the agent. Su said the platform showed that the tickets had been issued, and argued that the incident amounted to fraud under rules allowing consumers to seek a refund plus three times the payment.

The platform refunded the 7,304 yuan and transferred an additional 1,000 yuan to Su's Qunar account without first obtaining his consent. Qunar said it had punished the agent and would provide further compensation if Su could prove additional actual losses.

Qunar also said Su was involved in what it called "batch compensation fraud" and refused to support his claim for three times the payment, saying it planned to report the matter to police. Su rejected the allegation, saying he would give up the compensation claim and request a written apology. He also said he was considering legal action.

Lawyer Lin Qian of Beijing DeHeng Law Offices in Fuzhou said the agent had breached its contract by changing the passengers' information and preventing them from boarding. Besides refunding the ticket price, the platform could owe reasonable losses such as transportation, accommodation and the price difference for replacement tickets, according to the report.

Lin said three times compensation would depend on whether there was intentional deception. If the platform knew the ticket information was wrong but still displayed the booking as issued, the higher compensation could apply. She added that a claim of batch compensation fraud should also be supported by evidence and could not be used to reject the consumer's claim based only on the platform's own judgment.