Southwest Booking Strategy???

[kristenrice]

I am helping my sister plan her family trip to WDW next year. They are going to join our family but she is not telling her girls, and my girls won't know that their cousins are coming along with them.

She is going on a tight budget so I have been trying to help her out. The first thing she did was applied for the SWA Visa with the 50,000 bonus points. Our trip is in October and so I am assuming that the flights will be released sometime in March. Based on the general prices that I've seen, a R/T should be about 17,500 points ($250) or less. In March, she will have enough points to book only 3 of the R/T tickets that they will need.

This was my suggestion...

In an effort to help reduce her OOP cost, I told her to plan on booking 3 tickets with the points as soon as they become available. Then, I suggested she wait another 3-4 months so that she can accumulate more points, hopefully enough to get at least a one-way ticket. She is hesitant to book only 3 tickets when she needs 4. I told her that availability shouldn't be a problem. (For example, I did a "dummy" booking for 8 tickets for our flight in 11 days and there are still WGA fares available, as low as $109!) I realize that the cost can (and probably will) go up, but if she can accumulate enough points over those extra 3-4 months, it should still effectively lower her OOP cost. Plus, if the fares go DOWN, she will have the extra points refunded to her account. A cash credit will do her no good since she won't be flying again until 2016.

Did I give her sound advice? I would love to get the great deal I got for DH and I for our upcoming trip. I booked at 6:30am on the day the fares were released and I scored 2 non-stop round trip tickets for under 19,000 points. By the afternoon, they were listed as sold out, but then came back at about 12,000 each. I never saw them return to the price I paid so I think we managed to get lucky with a glitch or something.

 

[DebbieB]

I am helping my sister plan her family trip to WDW next year. They are going to join our family but she is not telling her girls, and my girls won't know that their cousins are coming along with them.

She is going on a tight budget so I have been trying to help her out. The first thing she did was applied for the SWA Visa with the 50,000 bonus points. Our trip is in October and so I am assuming that the flights will be released sometime in March. Based on the general prices that I've seen, a R/T should be about 17,500 points ($250) or less. In March, she will have enough points to book only 3 of the R/T tickets that they will need.

This was my suggestion...

In an effort to help reduce her OOP cost, I told her to plan on booking 3 tickets with the points as soon as they become available. Then, I suggested she wait another 3-4 months so that she can accumulate more points, hopefully enough to get at least a one-way ticket. She is hesitant to book only 3 tickets when she needs 4. I told her that availability shouldn't be a problem. (For example, I did a "dummy" booking for 8 tickets for our flight in 11 days and there are still WGA fares available, as low as $109!) I realize that the cost can (and probably will) go up, but if she can accumulate enough points over those extra 3-4 months, it should still effectively lower her OOP cost. Plus, if the fares go DOWN, she will have the extra points refunded to her account. A cash credit will do her no good since she won't be flying again until 2016.

Did I give her sound advice? I would love to get the great deal I got for DH and I for our upcoming trip. I booked at 6:30am on the day the fares were released and I scored 2 non-stop round trip tickets for under 19,000 points. By the afternoon, they were listed as sold out, but then came back at about 12,000 each. I never saw them return to the price I paid so I think we managed to get lucky with a glitch or something.

Hopefully you can get it booked before March 31, when the number of points required goes up.

http://boardingarea.com/pointsmiles...uthwest-rapids-rewards-increases-award-costs/

She may want to consider buying the extra points she needs for the 4th ticket, they are currently $27.50 per 1,000. There would be more flexibility with points.

 

[kristenrice]

Hopefully you can get it booked before March 31, when the number of points required goes up.

http://boardingarea.com/pointsmiles...uthwest-rapids-rewards-increases-award-costs/

She may want to consider buying the extra points she needs for the 4th ticket, they are currently $27.50 per 1,000. There would be more flexibility with points.

This was another consideration that crossed my mind. We'll have to wait and see how many points she accumulates and what the tickets will cost when she can buy them.

Her biggest fear is buying only 3 when she needs 4. I think her concern is unfounded because I am almost 100% sure that the fares will not sell out from Grand Rapids to MCO for an October trip.

 

[greenclan67]

If they did go up. Flint has been much cheaper then Grand Rapids. I am flying Flint to Tampa at Xmas dec 23 back jan 2. $102 each way and a lot of $99 farez from there too.

 

[kristenrice]

If they did go up. Flint has been much cheaper then Grand Rapids. I am flying Flint to Tampa at Xmas dec 23 back jan 2. $102 each way and a lot of $99 farez from there too.

Since we live only a few miles from the Grand Rapids airport, Flint would have to be substantially cheaper to justify the drive. We rarely drive and fly on the same day so we get a hotel (with a park n fly rate) for the night before. Before AirTran/SW came to GR, it was always cheaper to drive to Detroit and get a hotel room than it was to fly out of GR. AirTran had R/T fares that were $150 or less back in those days. Compared to the cheapest (Delta) out of GR, which had a layover...in Detroit!...which was about $300+. We did the drive to Detroit in 2012, but there were 15 people flying and the price difference was about $100/ticket. So, even after 4 hotel rooms (3 with parking included), we still saved almost $700 by driving to Detroit. Now, the fares from GR are quite similar, sometimes even less, so we don't bother with the drive. We live just 4 miles from the GR airport so the savings have to be substantial enough to override the convenience.

 

[donmil723]

Could she book all 4 for one-way when it opens? Then wait to book the other one way leg after she gets more points. That way she knows they will all be on the same flight.

 

[lost*in*cyberspace]

Could she book all 4 for one-way when it opens? Then wait to book the other one way leg after she gets more points. That way she knows they will all be on the same flight.

Of course she can do this.

 

[CarolMN]

....(snip).......Her biggest fear is buying only 3 when she needs 4. I think her concern is unfounded because I am almost 100% sure that the fares will not sell out from Grand Rapids to MCO for an October trip.

October can be a problem over the Columbus Day Holiday weekend and when the nearby school systems have a fall break. But I assume you already checked all of that out. Good luck!