Southwest Credit Card 50,000 miles

[MagicalMawMaw]

Thanks for the answer...now another question:

We've only bought Southwest tickets once. I've watched the prices & they dropped so I have a pretty fair credit now. Can you use that credit & the points too? Or just points or just $ to purchase?

Also, if you don't have enough points to purchase a whole ticket can use use $ to pay the rest...or do you need to wait till you have enough points to purchase a full ticket?

If this makes sense & anybody knows...thanks for helping me out!

 

[Judyat]

Yes my son got the same deal las Thursday. You have to spend $2,000 in first 3 months to get 2 round trips. I could do that but he wouldn't want to. Oh well.

 

[DawnM]

So is this deal invitation only?

 

[platamama]

Thanks for the answer...now another question:

We've only bought Southwest tickets once. I've watched the prices & they dropped so I have a pretty fair credit now. Can you use that credit & the points too? Or just points or just $ to purchase?

Also, if you don't have enough points to purchase a whole ticket can use use $ to pay the rest...or do you need to wait till you have enough points to purchase a full ticket?

If this makes sense & anybody knows...thanks for helping me out!

We fly SW more than any other airline. So here's what I know from my experience:

I just redeemed reward tickets yesterday. You have to buy tickets either via points OR $ but cannot combine the two. EXCEPT I was able to apply previous credits towards the $2.50 (each way) fee that you have to pay when getting award tickets. I don't think they apply to Early Check-in though, at least they didn't the last time I asked about it.

Something I learned while buying tickets through Rapid Reward points: if one person has enough points to purchase for themselves AND others (e.g. I used DH's points for tickets for 3 of us), the points can be taken all out of one individual's RR point balance. However, you end up with different confirmation #s for each person vs. when you pay via credit card. When you pay with a credit card, you can have 1+ passenger on one confirmation # - - this makes it is easier to check in since you only need to go through 1 check-in process for everyone on the itinerary. And will have close together boarding numbers (usually consecutive but not necessarily). There are no assigned seats, you just get a boarding number and you pick your seat.

With separate confirmation #s, each passenger has to check-in separately and you may end up with boarding numbers that are spread out. To try to deal with that, we will do synchronized checkins on two smartphones and one computer and hope for the best.

With ticketless travel funds (TTF), those may only be applied for the specific person that the original tickets were purchased for. (No swapping passengers anymore...oh those were the days.) Also, if you end up changing your fare again because it dropped even lower, that will be part of your TTF BUT when you go to apply it as a payment form, it will count as yet another form of payment (you can only make a total of 4 forms of payment for one purchase). Example: I changed reservations twice to capture lower fares. When I went to use them, they showed up as two forms of payment, even though it was the same confirmation# being applied.

Another thing I've experienced is that if I use a credit card to pay for the remainder due after applying credits, and then if I go and cancel the reservation, those funds take on the expiration date of the ticketless funds that I tried to use. Example: On 2/2/13 I use TTF that expire on 10/25/13, but need to pay with a credit card to make up the difference. I then cancel that reservation and all that money now becomes part of the 10/25/13 expiration date TTF, and does NOT expire on 2/2/14 as I expected. So use caution there too.

Lesson here is to keep very detailed records of your confirmation numbers, which passenger those belong to, and what the expiration date of those credits are. Expiration date means that travel has to occur by that date (not just buying a ticket). Since I started using a spreadsheet, it's been a lot easier to track than random post-its I'd scribble stuff down on.

I also highly recommend booking one-way fares rather than a round trip. There's no difference in price, and it's simpler to change if the fare drops.

It might sound like SW is a hassle, but I think it beats $200-300 Change Fees that some airlines are starting to charge!

 

[MagicalMawMaw]

Thanks for the help.

 

[leelee9878]

Does anyone know if the miles expire? We already bought our tickets for September, but I am sure we will be going next year. Just want to see if there is a ticking clock on the miles.

 

[letsgoreds]

Does anyone know if you can use these SW points on Airtran flights? I hare read of others booking Airtran flights on SW website.

Thanks!

 

[paysensmom]

When do you get the points? How soon can you use them? I have spent the required amount in the allotted time.

 

[hsmamato2]

I think I need to go back and read that other SW thread, but it seemed like people got more than 2 flights out of the 50K points.

When I go to the SW site, it appears a $300 ticket (which is about what I will be looking at to get to the West Coast from the East) would be 18K miles......so 50K miles will equal 2 tickets with just a little left over. Is this correct?

SWA has a great program-50k pts. can get you a lot of travel,esp. since you can book,and rebook if fares go down,and still use those points later...

 

[hsmamato2]

SWA is one of the easiest and best flight programs to use
You get the points when you reach the spend,and pay the balance in the allotted time
When I did it,I spent fast,and PIF within a couple of weeks,they showed when the bill cycle ended
the points don't expire-
50k points is worth WAY more than a couple of R/T flights..... just like when paying $$ for flights, you watch for sales...
SWA allows free changes to your flights....so if you buy,and it drops, you just change to the cheaper one,and the points go back into your acct.
It is always a good idea to book 2 one way flights,for ease of changing,if a sale pops up. (sometimes it's a sale in only one direction)
Yes, I book using just points frequently,and we all travel with a diff. conf. #
keep them organized,and it's easy. Also, no assigned seating, so you have to check in online at 24 hrs. ahead of flight yourself.(I do it for each diff. conf. #,no biggie)
If You reach 110k points in ONE Rapid Rewards acct, you get a companion pass which flies your companion FREE for the rest of this year,and all of the next.(yes,it's for real-best perk ever)
So.... if you have one card with the 50k offer,and you get a 2nd in the same name/account....you are pretty close right there to companion pass status. Figure it double (at least) the value of that initial bonus.
If you get the 69.00 card, you will get 3k points each year when you pay the fee
If you have the 99.00 card, you get 6k points.
Each dollar you spend on the card, you get a point in your acct. It's simple.
There is also a shopping portal online which gets you extra points for shopping thru them (i.e. walmart.com,etc)
NEVER carry a cc balance,or your 'rewards' are pretty much nil
and again, SWA ROCKS

 

[Mersmom98]

The points will show up in your Rapid Rewards account a couple of days after your monthly statement closes and you can redeem them that day.

 

[leelee9878]

I just applied and got instantly approved which I wasn't expecting since I already have 2 Chase cards. Excited for rewards that I actually will use and a decent amount of them!

 

[hsmamato2]

I wish that offer was public....it's so good

 

[leelee9878]

I wish that offer was public....it's so good

It might be worthwhile to give them a call and see if they will extend the offer to you.