pshuang

I guess to summarize, my aggregated rules of thumb for RR 1.0 awards management is:

On 02/28/2011 (or a few days before to be safe in case Southwest's computer systems get overwhelmed on the last day):

• EXTEND!! if your award is already >12 months expired: because after the RR 2.0 epoch, awards that are >12 months expired are GONE.
• PREMATURELY EXTEND if your award is already expired but by less than <12 months. You are spending the $50 to extend early, but you would have had to spend the $50 to use the award later anyway. Spending early lets you fly on your award until 02/28/2014, which is much later than the deadline to fly would have been if you don't prematurely extend.
• MAYBE PREMATURELY EXTEND if your award is is not expired yet but will expire before 09/01/2011. If you prematurely extend, you are spending $50 that you might not have needed to spend if you end up using your award before its current expiration. But prematurely extending does buy you additional time to potentially use the award, up until 02/28/2014, but possibly having to spend another $50 down the road.
• ONLY EXTEND LATER IF NEEDED if your award will not expire until after 09/01/2011.

AZChick

I should add that nowhere on the SW newrapidrewards site does it say that there is a LIMIT to the number of awards in the conversion you can earn.

pshuang

So by my rules of thumb....

Expired: 11/2/10 [ACT], 11/2/10 [ACT], 1/2/11 [ACT], 1/2/11 [ACT], 1/4/11 [ACT]
Active: 2/22/11 [ACT], 4/2/11 [ACT], 4/21/11 [ACT], 5/10/11 [ACT], 6/2/11 [ACT], 10/2/11 [STAND], 1/3/12 [STAND]
... And [STAND] for any additional Standard awards you earn from here on out.

Personally, on the [ACT] awards, I'd take the following actions, but this is a much more personal judgment call depending on what mix of Standard and Freedom awards suit your award redemption needs. It's also a leap of faith that Southwest doesn't drastically alter the availability of Standard awards in the coming years. (If you think Southwest will make Standard awards nearly impossible to redeem, then you want to convert nearly everything to Freedom awards.)

Pay $50 to prematurely extend: 11/2/10, 11/2/10, 1/2/11, 1/2/11, 1/4/11, 2/22/11
... then elect to convert two newly dated Standard award to a Freedom award.
Pay $50 to convert unexpired Standard awards to newly dated Freedom award: 4/2/11 + 4/21/11
Pay $50 to convert unexpired Standard awards to newly dated Freedom award: 5/10/11 + 6/2/11

This leaves you with 6 Standard awards, 3 Freedom awards, and a partridge in a pear tree left over.

benmaller

In the T & C's it states:

•After the transition date, Members will have the one-time option to convert Rapid Rewards Points earned after transition into credits in order to reach a total of 16 credits and receive a Standard Award. The conversion of Rapid Rewards Points into credits to receive a Standard Award can only be completed online at www.southwest.com by Members logged into their Rapid Rewards Account

You can only convert what is needed to complete an award.

CALimey

I wonder if English skills are next on their agenda?

username

Forgot about that - if one can read about the new program and understand it, I think that proves proficiency in English skills

uxb

Clearly, Virgin would be the best to fly LAX > SFO (instead of OAK) cos it offers the exact same programme as RR 2, and it has inflight Wi-fi and entertainment options that WN does not have.

toomanybooks

I had hoped this would stay quiet, because it's an incredible deal. But of course there's no way to do that.

I can hardly imagine a more attractive deal than 2 year's Companion Pass off a Jan 1 Starpoints, Diners, or Choice dump. Not to mention the pile of points for Award redemption, which in my case will cover a lot of my annual needs. As someone said above, if you don't care about A-List benefits, you could be spending a lot less on WN tickets. This might have the effect of making WN lower its fares.

It's hard to believe they will let this deal stand forever, but it seems to be an artifact of the calendar year qualification period.

The more I look at RR 2.0, the more I think it will have benefits for us and for WN. Because of the granularity of the points, they will have LOTS of opportunities for offers, bonuses, etc. that were cumbersome before because of the credit system. To goose redemptions, for a short time or on specific routes, they could make it 50 points per dollar on a WGA fare. Or they could rebate a percentage of Awards. All kinds of possibilities come up more easily with a quasi-cash "currency" as compared to a mileage-based one.

toomanybooks

If you are going to do this, do it fast. I have, and it's not instantaneous. Call Chase and ask how long.

rove312

It's been over 24 hours since I asked about the credits for the anniversary of having the Visa card:

I think I've read through and not seen a reply. Anyone?

uxb

This whole thread makes me sick to my stomach. I used to fly WN religiously from MDW > ISP whilst earning my JD/MBA at UChicago. I still fly WN from LA area to SF area and from LA-area to PHX, but not as regularly or religiously. I have enough points in my SPG and HH accounts to earn a companion pass, but I am not sure if it is worth it. Traveling WN TCON is not such a great experience.

So:

1. Should I just convert enough SPG or HH points to top off an award, or should I hold over to and exercise

2. With companion pass, my companion travels free wherever I travel til the end of 2012? Can I change companion if I 86 my g/f or travel w/ a family member? Will the change limit remain the same in RR 2.0?

Thoughts/suggestions are greatly appreciated.

sdsearch

It's not just math, it's also prediction of the future.

If you plan to book an award two months from now, chances are at a legacy it will cost either 25k or at most 50k. That's comparativley simple.

With RR 2.0, you cannot know precisly how much it will cost at all, because you can predict what fares at what exact prices will be available on that route on the day you are ready to book. That's the big complexity: You cannot aim to save something as simple as 50k miles (and then not be sure whether you'll use half or all of it for an award), you have to keep saving who knows how much and then only find out at the time of booking whether that was enough.

Unless Southwest still has a policy of a systemwide cap to Anytime Fares, you can't figure this out ahead of time. If they do have such a systemwide cap still, what is it now (and how often has it changed in the past)?

(I'm presuming here that ther eis no situation where Anytime Fares are sold out but Business Fares are still available. If that situation does occur, then it would cost even more, because of the higher Business Fare multipleir.)

To be fair, it's not much more complex than buying fares outright. Except that the cost in points is based not on just what fare cost in money would be, but in which column that cost appears! So in one sense it is still more complicated than buying fares outright (iwth ordinary money)!

In contrast, at the legacies, you know that any seat (on thier own metal) that's avialable for sale, no matter what the price is on sale, is available for 50k roundtrip coach (excpet maybe more on Delta with its three tiers of award levels). To me, that makes deciding whether to even look for an award much simpler than with the RR 2.0 system: Look for an award when the money fare is high, pay with money when the money fare is low.

But when exactly show you use an award under RR 2.0 versus pay with money? As the program is described, it's just as much a toss-up on every flight; you might as well just use it when you want to save money, because you will never find a higher value for it.

In that sense, once again, it is simpler, but for a reason most who value value don't like: There's no decision that needs to be made whether to save the points, because their value compared to opaying money is always the same.

(Which, if you're earning the credit card, means that you've juist turned an airline card basically into a cashback card!!!0

toomanybooks

Where did you read this?

uxb

I could've sworn I read it in this thread or on the newrapidrewards site, but I'll edit my comment off since I cannot find it.

sdsearch

If you look carefully at all the hotel and car earning stuff in the RR 2.0 preview, you'll see that every one of these partners that gave 0.5 credits before gives 600 points now.

That sounds nice, but it also smells of being a temporary kludge to deal with the fact that the hotels can't change to a new Southwest currency that fast.

Hotels that typically give 1/5 of the miles, like Hampton, are so far giving the same 600 points as their full-miles brothers, like Doubletree. Hotels which typically give miles proportional to spend, like Marriott, are so far giving flat 600 points.

I doubt they are doing this for any reason except that they're still working in 0.5 credit increments internally.

So I suspect at the very beginning, hotel transfer rates may also not change drastically.

But as soon as each hotel program adapts their system to "know" that Southwest uses a miles-like currency with "fine gradation", I fear they will drastically change what you earn.

So, for example, Southwest is likely at some point to stop being the loophole for earning a high amount of mileage with Southwest when they give a low amount of mileage with everyone else.

And Southwest will stop being a better value on cheaper one-night stays at Courtyards once Marriott Rewards goes to per-dolalr on Southwest the way they are on all miles/points-based airline partners already.

And those budget hotel families like Best Western and Choice which give only 250 miles (not 500) to "big" airlines, will they really want to continue to give 600 points to Southwest once they can decide on any number of points???

And over the car rental companies: They typically give only 50 miles/day for "big" airlines. Will they really continue to always give a flat 600 points per rental, once they adjust their systems so they can give any number of points???

So I think while the day of earning flights fast through higher-than-majors partner earning (at hotels and car rentals) may not be over yet, I wonder if it's going to come a bit down the line (and maybe not all at once, since it might be as each company adjusts their systems to be able to issue directly into RR 2.0 points)?