A man bought $250,000 of plane tickets for $17,000 after a Japanese airline made a mistake with currency conversions, report says

• A currency mistake meant All Nippon Airways underpriced some first- and business-class flights.
• A passenger told Bloomberg he'd bought 25 tickets, including one with an almost 95% discount.

A man bought airline tickets worth $250,000 for just $17,000 after the Japanese airline All Nippon Airways made a mistake with currency conversions, Bloomberg reported.

Herman Yip, who runs a travel website and lives in Hong Kong, told Bloomberg that he bought 25 tickets at heavy discounts.

Yip said that he'd bought tickets for family and friends as well as for himself. "I didn't even bother to ask them whether they were able to make it or not, as I needed to book really quickly," he told Bloomberg.

Bloomberg reported that the flights he purchased included a first-class round-trip from Jakarta, Indonesia, to Aruba via Tokyo and New York, that cost just $890 – or a discount of close to 95%. After his order was confirmed, Yip was also able to change his flights for free, so he rebooked the first leg of the trip to start in Bangkok, he said.

Johnny Wong, who works in the airline industry, told Bloomberg that he'd booked return business-class flights from Jakarta to Honolulu via Tokyo for 13 million dong, or about $550, after noticing the same mistake.

"I never thought I'd catch such a deal," Wong said, adding that he rushed to buy his tickets before the airline noticed the error.

Bloomberg reported that most of the mistakenly priced tickets were for journeys starting with a flight from Jakarta to Japan and then to New York.

Another person snapped up a ticket for business-class flights from Jakarta to New York, with layovers in Singapore and Tokyo on the way there and Tokyo on the way back for just $300, down from an average price of $10,000, Bloomberg reported. The journey consists of five flights altogether.

All Nippon Airways previously said that the tickets were sold cheaply in error when an incorrect currency conversion was displayed on its Vietnamese website, China's Central News Agency reported.

In situations like this, Yip said that acting quickly and being flexible is important because lots of people would likely be looking to buy tickets.

"If you see something that's probably a 10th of the original price, just book," he told Bloomberg. "It's very likely you'll able to change or cancel, because the airline will always want you to cancel."