“Award Chart: Points are worth about 1.65 cents each toward Wanna Get Away fares (depending on taxes). Changes: Free. Cancellations: Free. Close-In Booking Fees: None. Stopovers and Open-Jaws: N/A. You can create all of the stopovers and open-jaws that you wish if you break your trip into multiple one-way awards. Fuel Surcharges: None.”

“Go to Southwest to search for award flights. The process of searching for an award flight is very straightforward, so I’ll skip the in-depth tutorial. In fact, it is the exact same process as searching for a revenue ticket except that you’ll select to see your fares in Points instead of Dollars.”

Using Your Companion Pass
“If you have the Southwest Airlines Companion Pass, you’ll first want to have a ticket booked for yourself. It doesn’t matter if it’s a revenue or award ticket or even if someone else is paying – it just has to be in your name. Once you have that…”

Advanced Tips & Tricks
“Rebooking flights to save points – Because Southwest reward flights have no cancellation or change fees, if the prices of your flights drop, you can rebook them and have the difference in points refunded to your account. To do this, go to Change Air Reservation and enter your confirmation number, first name, and last name. Select which flights you want to change (you can do both at once), and perform your search. Choose your new flights, and on the final checkout screen, you’ll see the amount of Rapid Rewards points being refunded to you. You can do this an unlimited number of times before your trip.”

The post Southwest Airlines using Miles appeared first on Miles Briefs.

“Signup bonus of 40,000 miles after $1,000 spend in 3 months
Additional bonus of 25,000 miles after $15,000 total spend in 12 months (i.e. $14,000 additional spend after earning the main bonus)
2x miles on Southwest and Rapid Rewards hotel and car rental partner purchases
7,500 anniversary points each year
$75 annual Southwest travel credit
Four Upgraded Boardings per year when available
20% back on in-flight drinks, WiFi, messaging, and movies
$149 annual fee”

“First of all, you can’t get this card if you’re a cardholder of any other Southwest personal cards (business cards are okay), or if you’ve received the signup bonus from any Southwest personal cards within the past 24 months.”

“Assuming you can get approved, though, the signup bonus is not that great. 40,000 miles after $1,000 spend is decent, but we’ve seen higher bonuses in the past with other Southwest cards. Spending $15,000 in a year to get another 25,000 miles is something I technically consider to be worth doing; however, there are plenty of other credit cards that provide similar value without having to do so much spend. So while this bonus is decent on the surface, I don’t really recommend applying for this card because much of the competition is simply better.”

“For a frequent Southwest flyer, the 7,500 anniversary points + $75 annual Southwest travel credit are worth more than the $149 annual fee, but only by about $20 or so. Combine that with the four upgraded boardings per year, and this card does provide some ongoing value for people who fly Southwest regularly. With that said, you would only be considering this card’s ongoing value if you were a cardholder in the first place, and, as mentioned above, I don’t really think this card is worth getting right now. Let’s wait and see if a better bonus comes along.”

“P.S. Note that the 2x miles on hotel and car rental purchases requires that you book through Southwest’s website, and 2x miles isn’t that much anyway. If I had this card, I would put zero spend on it after earning the bonus.”

The post New Credit Card: Chase Southwest Airlines Rapid Rewards Priority Card appeared first on Miles Briefs.

Companion Pass

“Before getting into how to earn Rapid Rewards points, we should discuss Southwest Airlines’ best benefit, the companion pass.”

“The Southwest Airlines Companion Pass allows you to designate one person to fly with you an unlimited number of times for free for up to two years (when you earn the pass, it is valid until December 31st of the following year). A companion pass earned in January 2016, for example, remains valid until December 31, 2017. You do still have to pay taxes and fees for the companion ticket, but they are only $5.60 each way for domestic flights. For international flights, a range of $20 to $70 each way is common. The companion ticket is available any time the companion pass holder is flying Southwest, even if someone else pays for the ticket (with money or points).”

“To receive a companion pass, you need to earn 125,000 qualifying Rapid Rewards points in a calendar year. The companion pass does not need to be “paid for” with the points – thus after earning the pass, you will still have 125,000 RR points to spend in your account. Most points you earn with Southwest are qualifying points, but with one huge exception: points transfers to Southwest from other programs such as Chase Ultimate Rewards, hotels, and other partners do NOT count. A second exception is transfers of RR points from one person to another, but there’s very little reason to do this anyway.”

Credit Cards

“The three Southwest cards below are the best for earning points with Rapid Rewards. Earning two signup bonuses ($2,000 in spend x 2) and completing another $6,000 in spend (i.e. $10,000 in total spend across two cards) will earn you a Southwest Airlines Companion Pass. You can view the current best offers for all of these cards at Credit Cards.”

Credit Card Minimum Signup Bonus / Spend / Time
Chase Southwest Airlines Rapid Rewards Plus Card 50,000 points / $2,000 / 3 months
Chase Southwest Airlines Rapid Rewards Premier Card 50,000 points / $2,000 / 3 months
Chase Southwest Airlines Rapid Rewards Premier Business Card 50,000 points / $2,000 / 3 months
Chase Sapphire Preferred Card 40,000 UR / $4,000 / 3 months
Chase Ink Plus Business Card 50,000 UR / $5,000 / 3 months

“Chase Ultimate Rewards can be transferred to Southwest Rapid Rewards at a 1:1 ratio, but I don’t recommend doing this unless you need to top off your account for a specific redemption. As mentioned above, UR transfers to Southwest do not count toward earning a companion pass.”

Credit Card Churning

“The Chase Southwest Airlines Rapid Rewards cards can be churned. The other two Chase cards (Sapphire and Ink) can be churned as well, but this may be difficult to do in practice. For more information, see How To Earn A Signup Bonus Multiple Times.”

Bonus Category Spending

Chase Sapphire Preferred: 2x points on Travel and Dining
Chase Ink Plus: 5x points on Office Supplies, Cell Phone, and Cable; 2x points on Gas and Hotels

Manufactured Spend

“The Chase Ink Plus can be very useful for manufactured spending. For more information, see How To Manufacture Spend.”

Dining Rewards

Southwest Rapid Rewards Dining.

Shopping Portal

Southwest Rapid Rewards Shopping.
Shop Through Chase (Ultimate Rewards).

Miles Expiration

“Rapid Rewards points expire after 24 months without any earning activity. Note that unlike many other airline mileage programs, redeeming miles will not extend your mileage expiration date.”

The post Southwest Airlines Earning appeared first on Miles Briefs.