nsx

Southwest has announced a comprehensive plan to preserve our elite benefits and travel funds. The option to convert travel funds to points is novel and welcome. This is an even better outcome than I had expected.

Excerpts from the full policy: https://www.southwest.com/RRcoronavirusupdates/

We’re extending tier status and Companion Pass benefits

• For Companion Pass holders, who earned Companion Pass benefits through December 31, 2020, we are extending your current Companion Pass benefits through June 30, 2021.
• For A-List and A-List Preferred Members who earned A-List or A-List Preferred status through December 31, 2020 and not through any type of promotion, we are extending your current earned status through December 31, 2021.
  • For Members enrolled in a promotion granting promotional A-List status or challenging a Member to extend promotional A-List status such as Status Match, Tier Challenge, Tier Experience, or a Corporate Status Challenge and who met the flight requirements by the promotion end date, we are extending your current promotional status through December 31, 2021. However, for Members enrolled in any of the above promotions and who to date have not met the flight requirements, we are extending the deadline to meet the promotion’s flight requirements to October 30, 2020.

These extensions will happen automatically and will be reflected in the My Account page of your Rapid Rewards® account over the coming weeks.

We are making it easier for Rapid Rewards Members to earn tier status and Companion Pass this year by giving everyone 15,000 tier qualifying points (TQPs), 10 qualifying one-way flight segments toward tier status, 25,000 Companion Pass qualifying points (CPQPs), and 25 qualifying one-way flight segments toward Companion Pass. This added boost will accelerate your progress toward achieving tier status and Companion Pass in 2020.

No action is necessary on your part—the 15,000 tier qualifying points, 25,000 Companion Pass qualifying points, and flight segments will be deposited into all Members’ accounts in the coming weeks. Tier qualifying points, Companion Pass qualifying points, and flight segments will be given to any Member who opened a Rapid Rewards account by April 1, 2020.

Travel Funds
Funds that are set to expire or funds that are created between March 1, 2020 and September 7, 2020, will have an expiration date of September 7, 2022.

Option to convert select travel funds into Rapid Rewards® points
We have added a new benefit for our valued Rapid Rewards Members. Those Members who have travel funds that are set to expire or funds that are created between March 1, 2020 and September 7, 2020 will have the option to convert those travel funds into Rapid Rewards points at the same rate you would be able to purchase a ticket with points today. We hope this provides our Members ultimate flexibility as Rapid Rewards points never expire, never have cancel or change fees (fare difference may apply), and you can redeem your points for anyone you choose. Our Technology Team is working to build this conversion capability, and we will be in touch when it is ready for you to use.

Vaselaney24

Cool.

worldwidedreamer

This is incredibly good news. Happy in this unicorn case of Southwest following the lead of United, Delta and the others.

Marko123

Great news! I expected the status extension but wasn't really expecting a CP extension so I'll be happy with my 6 extra months.

Marcus Harper

Southwest announced their plans for Alist, Alist preferred and companion pass.

Alist and Alist preferred extended thru Dec 2021 and companion pass thru June 2021.


https://www.southwestaircommunity.co...rs/ba-p/105891

Beetlesauce

Wow, my A-List was set to expire on 4/30/2020 and it's now been extended till 12/31/2021, if I'm reading correctly? That's great news.

Also get an extra 6 months for my CP expiring this year end. Nice.

And my travel funds expiring July 30 2020 now expires Sept 7th 2022. Really all around good job, SW.

dmbolp

Still nothing on soon-expiring LUV Vouchers? So book a flight and cancel, get extended Travel Funds, but lose the anonymity and tie them to a particular person?

vike16

So I"m confused...are these 25,000 points we can actually use to book or just 25,000 points toward a CP but not actually usable for flyilng?

ryanmcv

Great moves by Southwest. I'm currently on a promotional A-List status (have to fly 3 round trips by May 31 to extend status through end of year). If I'm reading this correctly, I now have until October 30 to complete three round trips, and if I do that, I will extend status through December 31, 2021. I was wondering how Southwest would handle this, and I have to say they've really gone above and beyond.

Marko123

I didn't realize status could expire midyear. I'm not sure in your case as the note says: For A-List and A-List Preferred Members who earned A-List or A-List Preferred status through December 31, 2020 and not through any type of promotion, we are extending your current earned status through December 31, 2021.

So maybe you'll just get 4/30/2021??

Marko123

The latter. The fine print says: * These TQPs and CPQPs cannot be redeemed for travel or through More Rewards, transferred, or donated. These TQPs and CPQPs are only available toward tier status or Companion Pass qualification calculations.

PAX62

Extensions of Elite Status, CP, Travel funds, and option to convert funds to points

kjwalker01

Interesting on CP. Unless they extend that, I'd expect a lot of people (myself included) to lose CP for at least 4 or 5 months starting on July 1. Definitely not complaining, though, as this is appreciated.

One question I do have is whether or not to keep using my SW card, or move to my other Chase card now. Usually I do that after qualifying for CP each fall.

dlaue

Why add 25,000 "points" which cannot be used for travel?

Instead, why not just reduce the number of points required to achieve the companion pass?

I am NOT complaining. This is a super move by our friends at Southwest. But, it just seems like the programming necessary to add a new category of points is more difficult than just lowering the required points.

Marcus Harper

yeah. We posted at the same time apparently. There was nothing posted when I posted.