Virgin Australia to refund 61,000 passengers for pricing error on ticket changes
Virgin Australia is offering refunds to more than 60,000 passengers who were overcharged for itinerary changes, dating back to April 2020.
The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission has been notified and will determine if any additional actions are required.
In a statement on its website on Thursday, Virgin said the issue occurred when tickets were repriced in response to passengers requesting itinerary changes between April 21, 2020 and March 31, 2025.
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By continuing you agree to our Terms and Privacy Policy.“In response, we immediately launched an internal investigation to understand what happened, the impact on our guests and took a number of actions to prevent this from occurring in the future,” Virgin said.
The airline has hired Deloitte Australia to accelerate the claims process for the 61,000 impacted passengers, who will be able to make a claim for up to 12 months. The average refund for each traveller is about $55.
A Virgin spokeswoman said it “sincerely apologise” to passengers who were overcharged.
“We . . . have launched an itinerary change claim program under which all eligible guests are being proactively contacted to process their refunds,” she said.
“We have undertaken a range of actions to prevent this from reoccurring in the future, so our guests can be confident when making changes to their bookings.”
It’s understood Virgin discovered the error when it tested an upgrade of its booking and ticketing system.
The pricing error comes as Virgin’s US parent Bain Capital prepares to get the airline back on to the Australian Securities Exchange.
But the company’s plans to list comes during market turmoil caused by US President Donald Trump’s trade war.
