Southwest Airlines Rapid Rewards Plus Card Review: $400+ Airfare Bonus / $250 in Amazon Gift Cards!
The Southwest Airlines Rapid Rewards® Plus Credit Card has bumped their sign-up bonus to 25,000 bonus Rapid Rewards points for new cardholders after the first purchase (of any amount). The huge “free flight” banner on the application page is based on the fact that one round-trip $416 Wanna Get Away fare would cost about 25,000 points.
In reality, the value of the bonus is over $400 in Southwest airfare, and you can break it up however you like. Any Wanna Get Away fare is eligible, so this bonus is very useful for Southwest fliers. For shorter flights, this could actually be more then one free flights. This offer is only for a limited time, so get it now if you want it.
Details
- Southwest always offers 2 free checked bags on every flight.
- No ticket change fees, so you can move your flight later or earlier as needed and just pay any fare difference. Wanna Get Away fares are the cheaper fares that the vast majority of non-business frugal travelers buy. Anytime fares add the option to be refunded for cash. Business Select adds Priority Boarding. However, as mentioned, if you cancel your flight, there are no ticket change fees.
- September 11th Security Fee? This is $2.50 each segment, up to $10 roundtrip. For a nonstop roundtrip, it’s $5.
- You can also redeem points on hotel stays, car rentals, international flights, and gift cards. For gift cards in general, 5,000 points = $50 value. Specifically, you can redeem 50,000 points for $500 in gift certificates at Amazon.com, Home Depot, Lowe’s, and Wal-mart. A good alternative if you don’t fly much or don’t live close to a Southwest city. (Update: Right now $50 at Amazon.com is only 4,000 points, letting you get $600 in Amazon credit for 48,000 points.)
- There is an annual fee of $69. However, you do get 3,000 bonus points each anniversary date which again is worth $50 towards a Wanna Get Away fare. The card also earns 1 points per dollar spent everywhere, which effectively means 1.67% back toward Wanna Get Away airfare, with double points given on Southwest airfare and affiliated hotel/car rental purchases.
Application Tips
If you have any issues with approval, call the Chase credit reconsideration line at 1-888-245-0625. Ask them politely for the exact reason why you were denied, and offer to cancel, merge together, and/or lower your existing credit lines in order to get the new card you want. Many times you’ll just be rejected by a computer that says you have too many cards or something. You should be offered some way to get approved, I have heard many success stories. They want your business.
Find more in Credit Cards, Deals & Offers | 11/10/11, 10:28am | Trackback
July 7th, 2011 at 3:37 am
Does anyone know when the first annual fee would apply? I’m wondering if I could apply for this card, get the reward points, use them up and cancel the card before I get hit for the fee. Thanks.
July 7th, 2011 at 4:57 am
I have the Southwest Plus card that has a $59 annual fee. The first year fee was not waived – it was charged on the first bill.
I wonder if I can move to the premier card and get the 50,000 points?
July 7th, 2011 at 5:45 am
This has a $99 annual fee. I was about to apply for it and that kind of stopped me in my tracks.
July 7th, 2011 at 6:18 am
Jeez. Another card I’m tempted to apply for, which would make it the fourth application in six months. Chase: y u give me so much free money
July 7th, 2011 at 8:53 am
Going for the Companion Pass is tempting but daunting. So after the 50,000 points bonus to get the Companion Pass you’d have to spend $60,000 using the credit card by the end of this year? Unless I am able to rack lots of points flying Southwest this year. Am I interpreting the offer correctly?
July 7th, 2011 at 10:04 am
I have a question for Jonathan? If you say, you apply to 3-4 cards every rolling 6 months, how often do you cancel them? Unless you end up having some 30 credit cards..
Won’t the canceling hurt your credit score.. I’m surprised you’ve never been denied so far!
July 7th, 2011 at 1:35 pm
Yes, this card has a $99 annual fee and it is not waived the first year. Most likely, it is charged in the beginning. You just have to weigh that along with the included $500-$800 bonus value.
Canceling cards is not a big deal to me at all. I cancel whenever I need to avoid annual fees I don’t wish to pay. Some cards are worth the annual fee to me. I don’t always get 3-4 cards every six months, it just depends on what is out there to get. Check out these older posts but with valid info:
http://www.mymoneyblog.com/credit_score_my_1.html
http://www.mymoneyblog.com/can.....score.html
I think I have been denied for having too many of one type of card (i.e. Chase) but after calling them and canceling the extra card, they approved me.
@Daniel – Yes, you have to earn the points by credit card spend (see all the ways to rack up spending like US Mint in old posts), actual flying (6 points per dollar spent on Wanna Get Away, 10 pts on Anytime, 12 pts on Biz Select), or by using their partners (hotels, car rentals, online shopping). It’s not easy unless you already fly SW regularly.
July 7th, 2011 at 2:25 pm
The 50,000 bonus points are not tier qualifying, so I don’t think they will count towards the Companion Pass.
Also, there is a business version of this card with the same 50,000 point promotion. Is it possible to apply for both?
July 7th, 2011 at 2:32 pm
I’ve added 4 CCs over the last 9 months, but only one shows up as a “hard pull” on my credit reports which I checked yesterday (all 3 agencies via annualcreditreport.com). So, while adding credit cards “might” hurt your score a little, there’s a chance it won’t show up as a hard pull – especially if you’re responding to a preapproved offer (where the CC company has already done a soft pull of your report). My list of soft pulls by the various banks is a whopping 2 pages long, but they don’t count against your score.
Also, just because you cancel a credit card doesn’t mean the information falls off your report. Most CC’s will stay on for 10 years. The only problem might be if you cancel too many cards and your “utilization rate” increases because your available credit decreases. Not really a problem for me since at last calculation, I have 120K in credit limits and don’t carry a balance.
I’ve churned the SW Visa twice in the last 3 years (4 round trip tickets). I canceled most recently in January of this year, so I doubt I will try again – even though it’s tempting.
July 7th, 2011 at 3:27 pm
@Me – This is what the Southwest site says:
You should be able to get both, that’s a really good point. Oh man, if I could take off an entire year and travel the country on Southwest…
July 7th, 2011 at 7:32 pm
Are you sure that you can redeem the 50,000 points for a gift card? I don’t see that anywhere. I just need to be sure about this before I apply for the card and commit to the $99 fee for the first year.
Guess I’ll call them up tomorrow, but just wondering if there’s some fine print somewhere that I’m missing which explains this.
July 7th, 2011 at 7:54 pm
It says right on the application page:
Specific inventory can be found on Southwest.com which redirects you to the fulfillment site AwardHQ.com. It won’t let me direct link, but here is a screenshot.
http://www.mymoneyblog.com/wor.....wardhq.gif
July 8th, 2011 at 9:19 am
Another great offer but they all seem to be lining up from Chase. Got in on the $500 bonus for Chase Sapphire and the Continental One Pass as while ago. But to get the Sapphire, had to cancel one of my other Chase cards. Not a big deal as that was one that didn’t have many benefits and I wasn’t using. But they also took a closer look at credit lines and it took a bit of negotiating to keep them from reducing one or two of them.
Unfortunately over the years, cards I had from different banks/financial institutions have all ended up being acquired by Chase.
Not a deal breaker but after the recent Sapphire offer, might have to wait a while on this one.
July 8th, 2011 at 8:10 pm
This card really looks appealing to me. I will be traveling quite a bit on Southwest in the next few months and your post really came in handy!
July 9th, 2011 at 4:35 am
Some folks aren’t too happy with how this program is designed — http://www.tnooz.com/2011/01/2.....west-blog/
I was going to apply, but it’s not worth it to risk having to fly in the middle of the night.
July 10th, 2011 at 4:14 pm
Interesting loophole there for the companion pass qualifying points. For most airlines, ‘qualifying points’ don’t include credit card spend. And for Southwest ‘tier qualifying points’ for things link A-list status don’t include credit card spend. But companion pass specifically does…fascinating…
July 15th, 2011 at 1:34 pm
the annual fee applies right away. By the way, “Purchased points and points earned from program enrollment, Tier bonuses, flight bonuses, and Partner bonuses do not count toward Companion Pass status.” The 50k points don’t apply to the Companion Pass.
July 19th, 2011 at 1:41 pm
I have a stellar credit score and very little open credit in comparison with my income but applied and was denied for this card. I received a denial letter in the mail from Chase stating I have too many cards with them. I have the Freedom and Sapphire already. I had never received a denial like this before and thought it was strange. It seems I’m on their radar!
July 19th, 2011 at 2:08 pm
@Eric Walton – Call the Chase credit reconsideration line at 1-888-245-0625. Ask them politely for the exact reason why you were denied. If you have a Chase card you are willing to close, they may very well allow you to close that one and open this Southwest card. Chase does have a set limit on the # of cards they allow people at one time.
July 26th, 2011 at 5:50 am
For whatever reason, my annual fee for this card is set at only $69.
July 26th, 2011 at 6:09 am
Did the fee for this card show up immediately? I’ve had the card for around 2 weeks and so far don’t see the annual fee for it listed.
July 26th, 2011 at 10:09 am
Effective the 25th of July the US mint no longer accepts credit cards for purchases of coins. Well, it was nice while it lasted.
July 28th, 2011 at 5:10 am
When are the points credited to your account.Is it when you make your first purchase
or when the statement period ends?
July 30th, 2011 at 1:47 pm
@Jonathan, thanks for posting the Chase reconsideration line! I spoke with them after I was rejected, and they were able to approve me after splitting my $20k credit from my existing Chase British Airways Visa card to $10k for each BA and SWA card.
October 18th, 2011 at 7:46 am
Are the points different than award flights? I know they switched about a year ago, so maybe they improved it, because I keep hearing “free flights can be used for any seat that’s available”, or some variation of that, while the award flights were essentially impossible to use on any flight anyone who works during the middle of the week would ever want to take.
I get the feeling that the catch is that it’s not really any seat that can be used for the free flights, but the cheapest seats… each flight it seems like has a limited number of the cheapest tickets available, sometimes it seems like there are a VERY limited number, as in none at all. They just put the box there and show it sold out to make the customer think they’re just sold out, when really they probably didn’t sell them in the first place. So any of those flights also can’t be bought with the free flight points (as I said, that’s how the award flights seemed to work anyway).
I just wasted two awards on two flights I’m most likely not going to even take, because they were going to expire in January and the only times available are ridiculously inconvenient. Even taking days off work doesn’t really help, because the days you take off are spent flying at a bad time. Like you’d think “okay, I’ll take friday off and fly thursday night, and get an extra day of vacation.” but it turns out no flights are available thursday evening/night, so you’ll also have to take thursday off.
October 18th, 2011 at 8:30 am
Bummer! I had my dh sign up for the card with $69 fee – was 25,000 points. Should have waited a few more weeks.
I did this deal earlier in the year. They credited the points the first statement. I did not mind the $99 fee for the rewards (Have earned about $2800 in credit card rewards this year, otherwise, so didn’t mind the investment. I usually would never pay a fee for any reward).
Interestingly? I just closed my Southwest Chase and they refunded the $99 fee. No idea why – I didn’t ask them too. I have also had luck in the past asking to have this kind of fee waived. So, for all these reasons I wouldn’t get too caught up in the annual fee. Of course, I closed the card as soon as I received my rewards.
October 18th, 2011 at 11:20 am
Right now you can cash out points for gift cards at a discount. What was 5,000 points is now 4,000 points. So, 48,000 points yields $600 in gift cards.
October 18th, 2011 at 12:06 pm
If you find the points aren’t worth enough to you in airfare for whatever reason, still sign up and convert the points to gift cards. $500 in gift cards to a store like Wal-Mart converts to cash through Plastic Jungle or the like at a rate of ~90%.
500 * .90 – 99.00 annual fee still leaves you with a pretty $350 just for signing up.
October 18th, 2011 at 12:29 pm
@Brent212 – Southwest is actually really easy in this regard because it is revenue based and not a flat point amount. Did you see my previous article ranking the airlines? In the study, it has over a 99% redemption rate.
http://www.mymoneyblog.com/fre.....wards.html
Basically, just go to Southwest.com and search for any trip, and you can see the Wanna Get Away rate, and then multiply by 60 for the amount of RR points needed.
@Alexandria – In this case, definitely ask for consideration to get the extra 25,000 points. I would try once on the phone, and then once via secure online message. Point out the current active promo and that you just missed it by days. I think you have a good chance of getting the difference, even without threatening to cancel or anything.
Good tip about annual fee!
@MAC – Good tip about the gift cards! That’s a 20% bonus.
@Cody – Definitely, Walmart cards are something like 97% when converted to Amazon.com as well.
October 18th, 2011 at 12:57 pm
How many Chase cc’s can you have before they say no? I have 4. One biz and two consumer, plus the Chase Sapphire I just applied for and was approved half an hour ago :p
If I apply for a 5th Chase card, will I get rejected? Don’t want to risk another hard pull AND get a rejection.
October 18th, 2011 at 1:15 pm
Yeah, I saw that article, although it’s not exactly clear what the percentage means. You’d think it means that it’s the percentage of the time that someone gets the flight they would get if they were using cash instead of miles/points/awards/whatever, but as far as I could see, it wasn’t stated, so it could mean that it’s the percentage of the time the miles/points/awards/whatever get used, which is worthless, since as with my situation, you can always use them for a flight you don’t actually want or that is much more inconvenient than a flight you’d buy with cash.
But regardless, I did go to the SW site and see that their new points system looks much better than the award system, since it appears that any flight can be purchased with points, whereas with the awards, in most cases they just couldn’t be used for any good flights.
October 18th, 2011 at 1:36 pm
Arrg, I just applied for the SW card but got a “Decision Pending” from Chase. This is about an hour after I applied and got approved for the Chase Sapphire card.
“Thanks for Applying.
We have received your application. Our analysts are currently reviewing your application, and our goal is to notify you within 10 days of this application. Notifications are usually sent within this time, but in some circumstances it may take up to 30 days for processing.
Please do not resubmit your application.”
So…does it mean it’s highly likely that I’d be rejected? I have 3 consumer and 1 biz card with Chase already. What’s the limit on the # of Chase cc’s you can have?
October 18th, 2011 at 1:44 pm
@Victoria – They do have some sort of limit, although I’ve heard varying reports from different people on the exact number. However, the most important thing is to remember the reconsideration line 1-888-245-0625. It’s unlikely you need 4 consumer cards at one time, so you can work with them to close an account or lower credit lines if needed.
However, I got deferred notification my last 2 times around with Chase, and eventually got approved without having to call. Took a few days.
October 18th, 2011 at 1:44 pm
Victoria, I got that the same reply the other day, and a few days later I got a letter in the mail saying that I had too many cards with Chase already so I wasn’t approved. I only have two other cards with Chase though, a Chase Freedom card and the Southwest card (I was applying for the Sapphire Preferred card).
October 18th, 2011 at 1:48 pm
@Mike – Call 1-888-245-0625 and talk to a human about it with your actual history in front of them. I have yet to hear of an instance where someone called and something was not able to be worked out. Check out the comments above. I think it’s definitely worth the effort if you’ve already applied.
October 18th, 2011 at 2:06 pm
I have excellent credit score and I am interested in applying for this card. But my main concern is, if I apply for this card, how much would my credit score go down ? I have plans to buy house within next 6 months. How much will it impact my mortgate rate ?
October 18th, 2011 at 2:20 pm
@Mike and @Jonathan,
So if I get rejected and call the reconsideration line, it might backfire and it’s possible they’ll want to reduce my credit lines? (@Mike- “But to get the Sapphire, had to cancel one of my other Chase cards. Not a big deal as that was one that didn’t have many benefits and I wasn’t using. But they also took a closer look at credit lines and it took a bit of negotiating to keep them from reducing one or two of them.”)
@Jonathan- what do you mean by deferred notification? You mean you got the decision pending but when you got the letter in the mail, you were approved?
October 18th, 2011 at 2:34 pm
I used this card bonus to pay for Christmas plane tickets. I was thrilled to save the $800! Thanks, Jonathan!
October 18th, 2011 at 3:23 pm
Thanks for the advice Jonathan, I called the number and they approved my card. They lowered the limit on my Southwest card to make up for this, which is just fine, since I’m planning on closing that card once I redeem the rewards.
October 18th, 2011 at 7:00 pm
@SaRa – Applying for new credit will affect your credit score temporarily, estimated is about 5-8 points for 6 months, then decreasing down to zero affect in 12-18 months. As long as your credit score is high enough, it won’t affect your mortgage rate, but I can’t say what will happen in any specific situation. If you really were to buy a house in 6 months and don’t have an 750+ score, I would probably wait just in case. That is the safe route. But I just refi’d with no issues, and had 3 new cards in last 12 months.
@Victoria – Yes, I got a pending decision, that ended up being an approval. Actually happens to me about half the time, the other half is instant approval. A deferral is not a sure rejection.
As for the reconsideration line, they may want something “in trade” for an approval. Let’s say you had 50k total credit, and they didn’t want to give you more than that. They might reduce your existing lines by 5k, and then allow you this new card with 5k credit limit. I’d say that’s worth the sign-up and other perks of the card.
@Amy F – I usually use my card perks to pay for family travel as well. Flights are definitely more expensive this year!
@Mike – Sweet, glad it worked out well for you. It’s always good to get a manual reconsideration, the initial application is mostly just a computerized decision.
October 18th, 2011 at 7:11 pm
Thanks Jonathan! I do hope I get this approved in the end. $500 extra bucks sound good to me
October 18th, 2011 at 7:36 pm
Thanks Jonathan. I kind of thought about it after the fact. Thinks for the tip to ask twice. My spouse was just going to call and ask so I came to look up the deal.
October 18th, 2011 at 8:24 pm
I got this card lasttime and cashed in the points. They tried to hit me with the annual fee but as luck would have it an offer arrived in the mail without the annual fee. Chase withdrew the fee. Gotta rember to cancel the card… $500 free dollars for a few credit points. Good deal.
Should get the wife to sign up…
October 19th, 2011 at 4:44 pm
Chase: 800-432-3117 (App status & check your credit limit)
October 19th, 2011 at 6:29 pm
Nice juicy offering. This is one airline which is never on my no-fly list so I guess it makes sense to have this card. The annual reward offset most of the fees so it almost pays for itself.
October 19th, 2011 at 7:02 pm
Ooh, thanks for the info LSD!
October 19th, 2011 at 9:03 pm
Decisions decisions. Liquidate points for $600 in Amazon Gift cards or save for $800+ in airfare?
October 20th, 2011 at 2:20 pm
Hey, we got the extra points. So, thank you again! We are up about $3600 this year in rewards. Unreal! (When I tried to close my Citi card, they offered me $100 to keep it open 1-2 more months – no purchase necessary – and the random Southwest Chase annual fee refund was very unexpected. So anyway, it keeps adding up).
To top it off, Southwest rewards are on sale today – FYI.
October 20th, 2011 at 4:56 pm
Just saw this on the southwest award website.
$50 Amazon.com Gift Card
01770
Was: 5,000 Points
Now: 4,000 Points
Alas, I have already redeemed my 50000 points. Could have redeemed now for $125 more!
October 20th, 2011 at 10:35 pm
NM, I saw the same thing in an email they send out. Could have redeemed for 20% more which is the extra $125. Ouch.
October 21st, 2011 at 1:58 pm
Guys, may be this is a dumb question. I already have chase southwest card my rewards statement says i have 50000 points credited. Now how do i redeem it. I went and created a southwest account, now how to get this 50000 points to the southwest website account?. please help
October 21st, 2011 at 10:13 pm
Anyone else having issues redeeming the point for Amazon Gift cards?
Via the SWA site I get to the awardshq.com site, when I try to add the Amazon GiftCard to my cart, I get sent to this screen, despite the fact that I am logged in:
In order to add items to your cart you must be a Rapid Rewards Credit Cardmember.
1. If you are already a Cardmember, but are not logged into your Rapid Rewards account, click here to login.
2. If you are not a Cardmember and would like to learn more about the benefits of the card, click here.
October 23rd, 2011 at 8:14 pm
I signed up for this card a couple months ago when they had the same deal, but with a $99 annual fee. I just wrote to Chase to ask them to refund $30 to me now that they are offering it with a $69 annual fee, or switch me over to those terms. I’ll report back if they go for it.
October 24th, 2011 at 6:07 am
Following up on my earlier post about $69 vs $99 annual fee. I got a response from Chase, but it wasn’t so good. They said the card I signed up for a couple months ago (with the same sign-up offer) was the Chase Southwest Rapid Rewards card. But this card now (with the same sign-up offer) is the Chase Southwest Rapid Rewards Plus card. Hmmm. So they were not willing to refund $30 of the annual fee, or switch me to the new terms. They said the account would have to be open one full year before I can switch to the other card “due to federal regulations.” (what a crock.)
October 24th, 2011 at 2:03 pm
Grah, I applied for the Sapphire card and the SW card on the same day. Approved for the Sapphire card but denied the SW card.
I called the reconsideration line and they wanted me to close my Sapphire card if I wanted the SW card. The CSR on the phone won’t let me close one of my other cards that I don’t use anymore, only “the most recent account.”
October 24th, 2011 at 2:34 pm
Wooo! I called again and spoke to someone else and she let me open the SW card if I canceled one of my older cards with a 15000 CL and gave up 7500 in CL (new SW limit is only 7500). Didn’t want to lose the 7500 in CL or 3 yrs of account history, but……tradeoff for $500 in GC!!
FYI- Recon line keeps a call log, so if you call again they will know what the CSR told you before.
October 24th, 2011 at 6:12 pm
If you got denied call 888-245-0625 (reconsideration line) and ask to be reconsidered.
October 28th, 2011 at 7:57 am
Anyone having trouble to redeem the points for Amazon gift cards? I keep getting the message that I should log in (despited being logged in) when adding the Amazon cards to my cart on the http://www.awardshq.com website)
November 1st, 2011 at 8:17 am
There is currently a discount on redeeming rewards right now (as of Nov 1st). I just redeemed 48,000 points for $600 of Walmart gift cards!
November 10th, 2011 at 12:16 pm
For those who dont have a southwest frequent flyer account, sign up with this promo code to get 250 points: GNAVRPDRWDS
November 10th, 2011 at 5:11 pm
@Stef – Yes. We called to redeem. Twice this month. Same issue.
I can’t believe the rewards are still on sale, since my last comment. We turned potential $250 reward (signed up too early) into $625, with this heads up. (Turned into $500 with bumped up rewards, and added $125 value with rewards sale).
November 10th, 2011 at 9:31 pm
HI. I just signed up the card yesterday. So how long did it take to get the reward points after the purchase? is the redeeming the amazon gift card instantly? Thanks
November 11th, 2011 at 6:44 am
@Stef, follow the directions at the bottom of this link. I was having an issue and this worked like a charm;
http://www.fatwallet.com/forums/finance/1133186/
@Kevin, Once I activated my card and made my first purchase, the 50,000 points showed up in a week. When I called to activate my card, they told me it would take 6 to 8 weeks to get the points.
November 11th, 2011 at 2:31 pm
I signed up last week and got my card yesterday. I logged in and saw the 20% discount on Gift Cards lasts only until December 15. Chase says 4-6 weeks for rewards to post after first transaction, but I’m hoping it’s quicker so I can make it in before Dec 15 deadline.
November 11th, 2011 at 9:27 pm
what you need to do:
1. Log into your SW account on any browser.
2. then go to my account, on the left side, RIGHT CLICK on Redeem for more reward (blue text), select copy link location, or if you are on IE, select Properties, then copy the whole URL
3. Paste the link into another tab, change the last part ….Flag=False to Flat=true
4. It should work this way. enjoy~
Credits go to Yumikogirl from SD.
November 11th, 2011 at 9:48 pm
@Dean. Thanks. Diu you redeem for the gift card?
November 11th, 2011 at 10:53 pm
Hm, did everyone get the points right away? Some people posted they did. I was told I’d get it in 1-2 billing cycles. It’s been 1 billing cycle, no points yet, so I called today and they said points will be credited on Dec 1, after the 2nd billing cycle posts.
I better get the points by then. To miss the Dec 15 deadline for the extra 20% would suck.
November 13th, 2011 at 2:33 pm
The bonus appears to be back in business if you go through the Southwest website…
November 14th, 2011 at 9:28 pm
Website/Blog Administrator-Can you check the deadline posted at the beginning of this article again? Just as Dan said, it appears the deal is still on through Southwest’s website and through Chase’s website.
Thanks.
November 17th, 2011 at 8:59 pm
Hi. when redeeming the amazon gift cards from Southwest, are these physical cards send in mail or codes send to your email? Thanks.
November 18th, 2011 at 9:24 am
Chase/Southwest is offering 20% savings when you redeem for gift cards this holiday season. I received an email this morning.
Go to southwest.com/morerewards, login to your Rapid Rewards® account and click on “Explore Rewards”.
2. Save 20% when you redeem for gift cards between now and December 15, 2011. You’ll automatically see the discount when you redeem.1
November 18th, 2011 at 1:43 pm
Great news for me. I just logged into my Southwest account and all my 50,000 miles were there! I’ve been checking daily. It’s been exactly one week since my first purchase! I had 2,000 bonus miles previously from flying Southwest, so I can now redeem my 52,000 points for $650 in gift cards!! I’ll be closing the card after that, naturally. I hope everyone else is as successful as I’ve been.
November 18th, 2011 at 2:52 pm
got my card last night, made a purchse right away, hopefully points will show up soon.
November 21st, 2011 at 1:45 pm
Just FYI, these are physical cards mailed out to you. I just redeemed for 13 (!) of the $50 ones, and order says they will be mailed first class postage.
November 21st, 2011 at 5:23 pm
thanks, i’m guessing you ordered by phone. im still waiting for points to show up. as of now i only have 500 points in southwest for signing up.
November 21st, 2011 at 5:29 pm
Just went on southwest.com and saw my points. Ordered 12 $50 amazon giftcards and 1 $25 card for 50400 points. Stoked.
November 21st, 2011 at 5:32 pm
should i expect my points after 1 week of purchase? i made the purchase on 17th this month.
November 22nd, 2011 at 6:31 am
Hey everyone – when I closed my Southwest choice, I already mentioned I was credited annual fee. (It had been more than 60 days – I read elsewhere they will refund before 30 or 60 days). Anyway, we just closed my spouse’s Southwest card and they did not automatically refund. So I simply asked if they were going to refund it, and they did. Yay! So ask ask ask! I never would have thought to ask this except of the automatic refund on the first card.
Secondly, my experience with points is this. They credit the points at the end of the billing cycle, and it takes about a week to transfer them over to Southwest. That said, my dh’s points did not transfer and we had to call to get that squared away. I knew it wasn’t right because my experience had been different. Once we called it took them 2-3 days for the points to show up. Then we had to call to redeem those points because we had same issues redeeming as many others commented. I suppose it was worth the hassle since the points were on sale. Phew! (When I had redeemed my own points, it was very easy and none of this hassle).
November 24th, 2011 at 5:30 pm
got my card on the 17th of this month, made a purchase right away. called in yesterday, because i didnt have a rr acount when signing up. got a response, “will mail a new card linked to my rr account”. not sure points will be transferred after the new card gets here or sometime next week. today is exactly a week since i got the card, maybe thanksgiving is delaying my points!!!
November 26th, 2011 at 10:06 am
The 50,000 point deal is back.
I just applied, but unfortunately, I forgot to add my Rapid Rewards number at the time of application.
Am I screwed?
November 26th, 2011 at 1:41 pm
To Nathan, it’s fine, but it will delay your points I think, I didn’t enter my rr number, I had to contact chase and give them my rr account and ask to link them. They said I will receive a new card. Got my card, on the 17′ still waiting for the bonus.
November 28th, 2011 at 4:21 pm
I used my first purchase to buy plane tickets in october. I received my first month statement which had the plane tixs but no annual fee listed yet. My points show up in my RR account. Should I cancel the card to avoid the annual fee. Will my points still be usable from my RR account?
December 1st, 2011 at 6:47 am
Hello,
I cannot add the $50 Amazon GC. The url for the quick fix has changed to http://www.southwest.com/rapid.....z-validate and I can no longer alter it to get it to work. I called SWRR customer support and they said that I cannot purchase the card on the phone because the Terms & Conditions have changed. Please help!! Thank you
December 10th, 2011 at 9:41 am
I got my 50,000 points and purchased 12 $50.00 amazon gift cards.
To redeem for amazon gift cards:
Sign in to your account then click “my account” , then click on Redeem for more reward, you’ll see the tab for gift cards/gift certificates. HTH
Thanks, Jonathan!
February 13th, 2012 at 2:30 pm
DON’T DO IT
I am SO lucky that Virgin Airlines is now flying out of PHL and that the United/USairways/Continental group can now beat prices, because Southwest has now lost my business for good. I signed up for their credit card right before the ridiculous rewards program conversion. In the process I never saw my “flight segment” old award system arrive. All I could ever find was reference to their damn “points” After CHASE the credit card company finally told me where to find the “flight segment” aka ‘old’ awards I did only to see that they expire in a month. I explained to southwest that I found their redesign quite confusing etc only to get an auto response that POLICY IS POLICY I am SO disappointed and always expected more for Southwest. Sad to see them acting like other airlines, which will now be getting a lot more of my business
April 2nd, 2012 at 7:59 pm
Sounds like a dumb question; but it seems like I remember prompts of this card coming up when I was making a ticket purchase. You don’t actually get approved instantly and able to use the account right away do you? I assume you are just applying and you’ll get your card in the mail weeks later; and can’t use until then right?