lkar

Well, after some experimentation this morning, it looks as though southwest blocks redemptions using thank you points, so scratch that. Nevertheless, if you buy tickets on a variety of airlines, you are still getting 2.6 cents per flight, versus 1.7 using southwest. Also, when you use thank you points, it's a paid ticket and eligible for miles and status credit.

The details of thank you points are not 100 percent straightforward and I don't want a mod to say I thread hijacked, so I'll give the basics here, with a comparison to WN points earned by credit card to keep it on topic.

Thank you points are earned with various citi products including its credit cards. It's one point per dollar, with a few bonus categories that give 1.2 points. They also have promos at times (like holidays) where spending can earn extra points. But, for purposes of the discussion, let's say it's 1:1.

In addition to thank you points, you can also earn "flight points." You get 1 point for every mile flown with a ticket purchased with the credit card. So, suppose you pay $400 on the card for a RT flight from LAX to JFK. You get 400 TY points for your spend, plus you also get 5,000 "flight points" for the miles corresponding to the flight. (There are some tricks to accumulating flight points too that are a bit beyond this discussion.)

So, what are flight points? Flight points are banked in your thank you account. So, to take this example, you would bank 5,000 flight points. Flight points are converted to thank you points at a rate of 1:1 for every dollar you spend on your card. So, it's complicated, but the bottom line is this: if you buy a ticket or two on your citi card you build up a bank of flight points and from that point forward you're getting 2 TY points for every dollar you spend on the card.

Thank you points can be used to book flights. You get 1.3 cents per point toward the ticket. You can mix and match and use points plus dollars. The airline sees it as a full cash purchase, so you get miles, status, upgrades, whatever. You book it through the thank you web site, which is like booking through orbitz, etc.

So, suppose USAir and WN are selling a nonrefundable (or WGA) ticket from PHX to MCO for $300. You want to use points for it. You could redeem 18,000 WN points for it, and it would be an award ticket. That would require $18k in spend on the WN credit card. Alternatively, you could redeem 23,000 TY points for the same ticket on US (and, if TY ever allows WN redemptions, on WN too I guess). With flight points, you could earn 23k TY points with 11.5k in spend -- or 2.6 cents per $1 of spend. Plus, you earn miles for the flight, it counts toward status, and you get upgraded if you have status, etc.

You can also use TY points for hotel redemptions, but the rates aren't as good and I think you don't get hotel chain points in most cases.

So, my original premise was wrong, because TY apparently at present can't be redeemed for WN flights. If you have to fly WN, then I guess you probably can't do much better than 1.7 cents per $1 of spend on the card. And if you are using the companion pass, you will of course want to fly WN. For travel where you can choose between WN and another airline, though, you get better value using TY points.