Travel Party of 5 | Points & Miles for Family Travel

Companion Pass Update - Maximizing Southwest's 100K Offers Before Time Runs Out (9/17!)

• Raya & Duane

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1:1 Points Travel Strategy Session - Book Here! Discounted price expires Sunday September 7th at 11:59pm MST. 

Southwest Airlines currently offers elevated bonuses on personal credit cards, making it easier than ever to earn the valuable Companion Pass that allows a designated person to fly with you nearly free.

• 100,000 point offers available on all three Southwest personal cards until September 17
• Southwest Companion Pass lets your designated companion fly with you for only taxes and fees ($5.60 per one-way domestic flight)
• When earned strategically, the pass can be valid for almost 24 months
• Families can save thousands by having two parents each earn a pass
• Two methods to earn: one-card strategy or traditional two-card method
• Timing is critical - all qualifying points must post in the same calendar year
• Southwest points are tied to cash prices, so more points are always better
• Companion Pass doesn't work on Southwest's international partner flights
• Card benefits vary: Priority card ($229 annual fee) allows seat selection at booking
• All cards now include first checked bag free

The elevated 100,000 point offers on Southwest personal cards expire September 17, so act quickly if you want to position yourself for a Companion Pass in early 2026.


Speaker 1:

Southwest has several elevated offers on their personal credit cards right now, which makes it even easier to earn a companion pass or two. So in today's episode we're doing an updated how to guide on how to earn the Southwest companion pass for you and maybe your P2 as well. So listen in. Hi, I'm Raya. And I'm Dwayne. And we are your hosts of the Travel Party of Five podcast, where we share how we travel as a family of five around the world.

Speaker 2:

We will also share how we use points and miles to travel as affordably as possible and sometimes even completely free.

Speaker 1:

So if you're wanting to travel more with your family but you're not sure how, we'd love for you to listen in.

Speaker 2:

So welcome to our podcast, where we hope you learn a thing or two to get you closer to your next trip.

Speaker 1:

Hello friends, welcome back to Travel Party of Five podcast. I am solo today. If you listened to last week's episode, you heard all about our very busy month of travel and this weekend that I'm recording, dwayne has actually been out of town visiting his best friend who lives in Houston, texas. So I have been solo parenting for the last three nights. He comes home later today, so we're excited for that. I finally have got the kids a little bit quiet so I can record this episode, and it has.

Speaker 1:

It has been a very busy few days, as you can imagine. Before we dive into the main topic today, I do just want to give a heads up that there is one week left of my points consultation discounted pricing. So if you have been considering signing up for that, it is currently $97. And it's going to go up to 147 in one week from the time this airs. And for a little context on the pricing, I spend a lot of time both kind of prepping for the call based on the notes and information that you give me, and then I also spend a lot of time after the call like really thinking through how I think I can best help you and putting that all into like a follow up document that I email out 24 to 48 hours after the call. So it is a good amount of time on my part, beyond just the 60 minutes that we spend on the call, and so I just wanted to give a little bit of kind of context as to why the price is going up, because I have been finding myself spending a lot of time, because I really want you guys to have like a good experience, but in order to justify my time, that is what needs to happen. So I'll put a link in the show notes and let's dive into today's episode. This episode was also a request, so, if you remember, a few weeks back I posted on Instagram asking for podcast episode requests. This was one of them, because a lot of the information that's currently out about the Southwest companion pass is a little bit outdated in that it goes over like the, the two card method for for earning the companion pass, and there is an elevated offer right now where you actually could potentially earn the companion pass with just one sign up bonus, and we're going to talk about how that may work in a little bit. And so I did agree like, yes, we should do an updated episode because we like use the heck out of our companion passes when we had them, and I do think that for certain families it is such a game changer.

Speaker 1:

So first let me dive into exactly what the companion pass is. If you are new or newer to points and miles, so the Southwest companion pass essentially allows you to fly a companion or like another person with you for essentially free, as long as you are also flying. So if you're going on a trip to anywhere that Southwest flies, you can add on your companion and they will get like their own ticket and everything, and the only thing you have to pay for is the taxes and fees. So if you're traveling domestically, that's $5 and 60 cents per leg or per flight. So that's an incredible deal. And if you are a family of four or more, then if each parent or partner gets a companion pass, then you can essentially fly four people for the price of two, and so for us we were able to fly five people for the price of three because Dwayne and I each had a companion pass and the way that it works and how you want to best maximize the companion pass the year that you earn the pass in. You then have the pass for the rest of that year, plus the entire following year plus the entire following year. So if you time it right, you can literally have this pass for almost a full 24 months, which is amazing. So we're going to dive into how you can do that and make that happen With current offers that are that are available.

Speaker 1:

I did want to get this episode out sooner rather than later, because the elevated offers on the cards that we're going to talk about today expire September 17. So you don't have long if you want to make this a reality. The other thing I'll touch on is there has been a lot of changes with Southwest over the last six to nine months. Right, they've switched over from open seating to now assigned seating. They charge for bags now. They didn't before. There are ways around that, like if you hold one of the credit cards, but the companion pass has been a source of I don't want to say contention, but it's been a hot topic because nobody knew if they were going to keep the companion pass for the next you know, year or two or beyond that. So they haven't gotten rid of it yet. It is still exists, it's still a thing, and even if they came out and said like, okay, we're not going to offer this as an option in 2026. I don't think that they would take it away from people who have already earned it. So I think you're totally fine to go ahead and continue down this path for now. But, you know, will the companion pass exist in five years? I have no idea, so we will see.

Speaker 1:

The other thing I will share is that I have not decided if we are going to earn companion passes again this year, and so, for a little background, if you are maybe a newer listener, when we first got started in points and miles, which was 2022, we, like the Southwest companion pass was one of the first things that we worked towards earning, both Dwayne and I, and so we earned it in the beginning of 2023. And we had it for all of 2023 and all of 2024. Or sorry, for the rest of 2023. And then all of 2024. And we use the heck out of that companion pass Actually companion passes because Duane and I each had one. So we went to Maui as a family of five. We went to Washington DC, we went to Kauai, we went to Costa Rica. Dwayne and I took several trips where we would just fly up for the weekend because we only had to pay for one flight. So he and I went to San Francisco, we went to Albuquerque for the balloon festival. He and I went to New York City for a long weekend for my birthday. We went to the Grand Caymans on our couples trip last year and so we took like five or six trips as a family and then a good like four trips just him and I in the time that we had those passes and it was phenomenal.

Speaker 1:

I could not recommend could not recommend it more for families if you're going to travel within the network that Southwest flies. So the reason that I don't know if we're going to get it again is, first of all, we didn't get it for 2025. Because you cannot earn the bonus on the cards again until it's been 24 months since you last earned the bonus, and so we earned our bonuses in like January and February, which means I couldn't have even applied for the cards until like January, february of this year, and we, you know, we probably could have earned the pass like in maybe March or whatever. But, number one, we didn't have a ton of travel to places where Southwest flies to and, number two, I still felt like I was kind of leaving a few months on the table, so that was ultimately why we didn't didn't do that.

Speaker 1:

I do say if you're going to get the passes or the companion pass one or two of them you do want to look at where Southwest flies to the companion pass, one or two of them. You do want to look at where Southwest flies to and just like see if that even makes sense for the travel plans that you have in your mind for the next two years. So for us, the other reason I'm considering maybe not getting it is we are really focusing on international travel and I think Southwest is great for, like if you want to go to the Caribbean or you want to go to maybe Central America right, costa Rica, belize, mexico, grand Caymans, any of any of those islands over there. But we like next year we're going to go to Thailand, we're going to go to Scotland and then kind of thinking Italy for fall break, because I've been to Italy several times. But I, first of all, I absolutely love it and second of all, I really want Dwayne and the kids to experience that. But I digress that'll, that'll be for another episode, and so I just don't see how the companion pass fits in for us other than to use it for positioning flights Pass fits in for us other than to use it for positioning flights. And if I'm being honest, southwest flights, like the points cost is, it's like pretty high and so like I just don't know, if I don't, I don't think it makes sense, I'm leaning towards not getting it, but I guess it's still up in the air.

Speaker 1:

The other thing to think about is all the Southwest cards are issued by Chase and Chase has definitely cracked down in recent like months around how many cards they're. They're giving you especially business cards, and I am Dwayne and I are both 424. So the other thing you have to keep in mind here is what is your 524 status? Because the only elevated offers right now are on the personal cards. So they are going to count towards your 524. And if you need to get a business and a personal, you have to make sure that the personal isn't going to put you at or above 524 so that you can still apply for the business card. So that's the other thing to keep in mind. And then for me personally, I'm like who knows if they'll even approve me for a business card at this point, like I chase, is denying me left and right these days. So, number one, I don't have high hopes that we could even achieve it. And number two, again, I just don't know if it makes sense for our travel plans. So those are the two things that I would consider if you are considering going for one or two companion passes.

Speaker 1:

Okay, so let's dive into what the elevated offers are and how you can earn the companion pass without having to open a bunch of cards. So let me pull up my little cheat sheet, because all of these cards have very similar names. Okay, so the three personal cards that all have elevated offers are going to be the Southwest Rapid Rewards Plus credit card. That one has a $99 annual fee. You earn 100,000 points after you spend $4,000 in the first five months from account opening. We're going to come back to that five months thing in a minute.

Speaker 1:

The second card, again elevated offer. It's the same offer. It's 100,000 points after you spend 4000. In the first five months, this one is called the Southwest Rapid Rewards Premier credit card. And then the third, third card same offer is called the Southwest Rapid Rewards Priority Credit Card. This one has an annual fee of $229. The second card I mentioned, the annual fee is $149. So I mentioned them in order of annual fee, right, so the annual fee does go up. The benefits are, you know, obviously increase a little bit with each card. You know, obviously increase a little bit with each card.

Speaker 1:

The the first one that I mentioned, the Southwest Rapid Rewards Plus credit card, that one is again the cheapest one, so $99 annual fee. That, in case you're not aware, the annual fee is applied to your first billing statement and that is the case for pretty much any card that has an annual fee, regardless of the bank, unless it specifically states that the annual fee is waived. One thing I see people ask a lot is like wait, I thought I wouldn't get charged the annual fee until my one year anniversary. That is incorrect. You are always going to be charged the annual fee the first month you have the card, unless it specifies otherwise. Okay, back to the card. So, even just having this $99 annual fee card, it gives you your first bag free because, remember now Southwest charges for bags, and then you can select a standard seat within 48 hours prior to departure, when available. So you can't choose seats upon booking, which is maybe not great if you're traveling as a family and you want to make sure you can get seats together.

Speaker 1:

The second card, so the 149 annual fee. That's the premier credit card. You also get your first bag free. Select a standard or preferred seat within 48 hours prior to departure. Okie, dokie. And then the third card. This is the $229 annual fee. You this is the one you get to choose your preferred seat at booking. So this is probably the one I would get between all three of those Because, yes, the annual fee is the highest of the personal cards, but choosing my seats together at booking is going to be super important to me when I'm traveling with five people, especially because my kids are little. If they were a little older they could sit by themselves.

Speaker 1:

But all three of these cards give you 10,000 companion pass qualifying points every year. They call it like a points boost. So the way that you earn the companion pass is you have to earn 135,000 Southwest points in the same calendar year. Okay, so I said we were going to come back to the five months that you have to meet the minimum spend. Here is why that is important and where this comes in.

Speaker 1:

So, essentially, the process would work like this you would open one of these cards, one of these cards with the elevated offer, and you would maybe spend. The minimum spend is $4,000. So maybe you'd spend like $3,000 on it Now in, in 2025. It's like what year is it and then you would put the card away. You would not use it for anything until after January 1 of 2026. Come January 1, you spend the additional $1,000 on that card, you are going to hit the minimum spend and you are going to earn your 100,000 points in 2026. Okay, the rest of your points. Remember, you're at 100 and you need 135. So you're going to get 10,000 points from the points boost that usually hits pretty early on in January. So now you're at 110,000 points. And let me give one more caveat before I dive into. The details are important to me when I'm traveling with five people, especially because my kids are little. If they were a little older they could sit by themselves. But all three of these cards give you 10,000 companion pass qualifying points every year. They call it like a points boost. So the way that you earn the companion pass is you have to earn 135,000 Southwest points in the same calendar year. Okay, so I said we were going to come back to the five months that you have to meet the minimum spend. Here is why that is important and where this comes in. So, essentially, the process would work like this you would open one of these cards, one of these cards with the elevated offer, and you would, you would maybe spend the minimum spend is $4,000. So maybe you'd spend like $3,000 on it Now in in 2025. It's like what year is it and then you would put the card away. You would not use it for anything until after January 1 of 2026. Come January 1, you spend the additional $1,000 on that card, you are going to hit the minimum spend and you are going to earn your 100,000 points in 2026. Okay, now I will the rest of your points remember. You're at 100, and you need 135. So you're going to get 10,000 points from the points boost that usually hits pretty early on in January. So now you're at 110,000 points plus let's call it 1000 for the spend that you did in January. So 111,000 points.

Speaker 1:

Now, if you are in a two player household, you're going to refer your player two and you're going to get 20,000 Southwest points for the referral. So now you're at 131,000 points. So you just need to figure out a way to get 4000 more points at that point to earn the companion pass. You can do that a couple of ways. So these cards are going to earn two x at gas stations and grocery stores. So if you wanted to spend like $2,000 at either dining not dining restaurants or grocery stores, then that would give you the 4000 points that you need. There's also a Southwest shopping portal.

Speaker 1:

You know there are other things that you can do, but the reason I don't love this method is, yes, it's it's kind of one less card you have to open, right. But the other thing is your player two is going to miss out on this elevated offer of 100,000 points. And if you have a family of four or five or even more than that, and you are wanting to maximize the Southwest Companion Pass, I still think the two card method is the way to go about it. And so the way the two card method works is you, as player one, would open up the first card and in normally I would say you should go for the business card first. However, the elevated offer is going to end again September 17. And the business cards only give you three months to meet the minimum spend, so you cannot open the business card before the personal card in this situation, because your minimum spend deadline is going to be still in 2025. And we need the minimum spend deadline to be in 2026.

Speaker 1:

So you would open up the personal card. You would get the 100,000 points, I'm sorry. You would open up the personal card, you would partially meet the minimum spend and then you would put it away. You would not earn. You would I'm going to repeat, you would not earn the 100,000 points in 2025.

Speaker 1:

Shortly after you are approved for the first card, the personal card, with the 100,000 point elevated offer, you would refer your player to okay, you're going to get 20,000 points for the referral, but those 20,000 points are not going to count towards your companion pass because they are going to live in 2025. And again, we need to get to 135,000 points, all in 2026. However, we still want the points. Okay, we want the points no matter what. So you're still going to refer. You just need to know that those 20,000 referral points are not going to count towards the companion pass, so we're not going to add them.

Speaker 1:

Okay, then, once you've both gotten approved for the personal cards, you're going to want to apply for one of the business cards. There's a premier business and a performance business and again they have similar you know benefits and one has $149 annual fee and the other one has a $299 annual fee. So you just have to look at the benefits and decide what's going to work for you. The cheaper one has a 60,000 bonus point offer and the higher annual fee has an 80,000 points. If it's me and I'm going to fly my family on almost exclusively Southwest for two years, I'm probably going for the higher offer and then again you're going to refer your player to, to that card and unless you're referring like December 27, maybe again those referral points are not going to count until 20. I'm sorry, they're going to count in 2025. They're likely not going to count in 2026. Unless, again, you're referring right at the end of the year.

Speaker 1:

The tricky part with this is for the business cards. Again, you only have three months from opening the account to meeting the minimum spend. So you don't even want to apply for those business cards for either one of you until like November, probably, maybe like end of October, but to be safe I would just say November would be a good timeframe. And then you have a full month in January to meet the minimum spend and you should be good to go Every single year.

Speaker 1:

There are people who either forget that they added their card to, like their Apple wallet or their Amazon thing, or they gave it to their, their spouse and you know their spouse has been using it and they earn the bonus early in 2025. There is no reversing that. Oh, or like, I've even seen retailers accidentally charge a card twice or they try to do like a refund, thinking that's gonna gonna count. Refunds don't count, it's initial spend only. So if you spend, like you know, $4,000, and then 1000 of it comes back like you've met the minimum spend. So you just have to be super, super careful. Like, don't add the card to any online wallets, don't, don't do anything with it. Literally put it away until January 1, once you're like maybe within 1000, I don't know $800 of meeting the minimum spend. And so, again, yes, you are each opening two cards to get this. You don't have to. You could do the first method I said and do the. You know the extra kind of jumping through hoops, but here's why I think the two card method still makes the most sense for families specifically. But here's why I think the two card method still makes the most sense for families specifically.

Speaker 1:

So when you earn the Southwest Companion Pass, again you have to get the 135,000 points in one calendar year. But you don't, like, you don't trade those points for the pass, right, you just get the pass. So then you still have all those points to use on flights for your family, for all the trips that you want to take. So like the more points the better. Because, number one, southwest again the flights have been going up in price. Southwest points prices are tied to their cash price. So if their cash price goes up, the points price goes up and again vice versa, if the cash price goes down, the points price goes down. So like there's really no way to get like outsized value from Southwest. Like you're not going to get three cents per point it's not not going to happen. But the benefit of that, especially if you're new to points and miles, is you don't have to worry about cents per point or like wasting your points, because it's going to be pretty much the same rough value no matter what. But I just think the more points you can have the better.

Speaker 1:

We ran out of points, like maybe a year and after like a year and a half, so for the last six months of having the pass we like either had to transfer points in from chase or pay cash. You know which is. No one wants to do that really. So I think again the two card method is the way to go. Even if you chose the cheaper business card, you'd still be ending up with over 160,000 points per person, right? So that's 320,000 points total.

Speaker 1:

I was looking up round trip flights to Hawaii the other day on Southwest, and their calendar is only open through May ish of 2026. But I did find round trip flights for roughly 60,000 points per person and so if you're a family of four that's only 120,000 points and you can fly all four of you. If you're a family of five it does get a little more pricey at 180,000 points for the five of you Because, remember, you're only paying the points for the two or three paid fares and then you're using the companion pass for the other hopefully two people in your family. So again, like the more points that you can have from Southwest when you have the companion pass, the better it is going to be for you. But if you are really cautious of your 524 status or maybe you can't get approved for a business card, like me lately, or whatever it may be. Just know that the one card like play or whatever you want to call it the one card method is also an option. It just involves a little more hoops. But either way, I'm going to repeat this again and if you're like listening to this and you know all about the companion pass, you're gonna be like, oh my god, we get it, but people don't get it. So I'm going to say it again all of the points have to land in 2026. If you mess up and you hit the spend early and you get the points in 2025, then you might as well figure out a way to hurry up and get the rest of the points so that at least you have the companion pass for all of 2026. Or be prepared to open up a third credit card and hit the minimum spend for that after January 1st of 2026. So, to sum up, I do think the Southwest Companion Pass is fantastic for families if there are places that Southwest flies that you really want to visit.

Speaker 1:

The one other thing that I do want to address briefly is Southwest has recently announced a couple of international partnerships and I do want to call out that the companion pass does not work for the international partner flights. So the newest one is, I think, china Airlines. They also announced Iceland air as a partner in the last maybe six months or so and so using you cannot use the companion pass to fly to Iceland. Okay, on Southwest, so I do. Maybe even Eva Air is the third one, but again, you cannot use the companion pass for international flights. So, like I really want to stress that, because if you want to go to Iceland, the Southwest companion pass is not your ticket to get there. If you want to go to Hawaii or like anywhere in the US or Costa Rica or I don't know the Caribbean, then yes, right. If you want to go to the Bahamas, yes, southwest is your, is your, your gal. But if you want to use it on international flights you cannot. So keep that in mind as well.

Speaker 1:

I will update if, if and when we decide we're going to go for the companion pass. Again, I just don't see it happening. I don't think that it makes sense for the travel that we have planned next year, but at the same time, like I kind of like hate letting it go if that makes sense. So I don't know. Tbd on that, if you have questions about the companion pass or your like specific situation, feel free to find me on Instagram, send me a DM at travel party of five. I am in there every day and I answer all DMS, as always. If you find this podcast helpful, we would so appreciate a rating or review wherever you listen, and we will catch you on the next one. Bye.