Virgin Atlantic Cuts Outbound Japan Fares

Virgin Atlantic Thursday said it is reducing prices of flights out of Tokyo after realising it was selling single journey flights for several times more than competitor British Airways.

The long-haul airline was charging in excess of GBP5,000 for a single ticket from Tokyo to London, but that was on a flight operated by All Nippon Airways Co. Ltd. (9202.TO). It is unlikely to be able to control the prices of other airlines' tickets it sells through any joint venture on its website.

Still, Virgin was selling flights for Saturday for GBP2413.29 including tax, according to the website it operates itself.

Rival BA was selling flights at about GBP600 for Saturday and GBP1,077.55 for Friday. BA's flights don't include tax.

After being contacted by Dow Jones Newswires, a spokeswoman for Virgin Atlantic said: "Our pricing department has picked this up and has now reduced the prices to reflect normal levels."

She couldn't immediately say how much flight prices would fall, but said: "The discrepancy with our pricing arose as usually there is so little demand for a one-way fare from Tokyo to London. However, in these exceptional circumstances we are taking steps to rectify this."

One passeneger who returned with Virgin earlier this week from Japan said he flew on an A340 that only accomodated 280 people, compared with up to 600 people normally.

Japan was hit Friday by an earthquake and subsequent tsunami that wiped out towns and may have claimed more than 10,000 lives. The disaster has escalated with the Fukushima nuclear facility seriously damaged.

-By Kaveri Niththyananthan, Dow Jones Newswires; 4420 7842 9299; kaveri.niththyananthan@dowjones.com

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