I've read the new informationm and am still confused about a new Basic fare ticket booked with points (assuming you can).

If you cancel the flight more than 10 minutes before takeoff, are your points refunded or kept?

says you get points back

Thanks.

The first sentence here seems clear enough. However with that being said, what is the need/point of the second sentence?

"For travel booked with Rapid Rewards points, if canceled, points will be returned to the Rapid Rewards account holder who booked the ticket. For Anytime or Business Select� reward travel reservations: the points used for booking will be redeposited to the purchaser's Rapid Rewards� account, and any taxes and fees associated with the reward travel reservation will be converted into a Transferable Flight Credit for future use."

It's about the cancel by T-10 minutes policy.
Basic//WGA+: Cancel at least 10 minutes prior to departure you get points, taxes and fees back . Everything forfeited if you didn't cancel by T-10 mins.
Anytime/Business Select: Cancel at least 10 minutes prior to departure you get everything back to original method of payment, cash and/or points. If you no showed, points go back to your account, any cash will be converted into a Transferable Flight Credit (that will now have a 12-month expiration)

Southwest Airlines Outlines Changes to Drive Revenue Growth and Reward its Most Loyal Customers | SWA Newsroom - Fare Product_3.11

What you quoted are supposed to apply only to Business Select and Anytime bookings only (under its new refundable policy), so I'm not sure they'd apply to Basic or even WGA+ fares since neither is "refundable", whether they're booked with cash or points. Historically, points have always been returned if an award is cancelled. But I don't think we can assume that'd be the case with the new fare structure. Especially with lower earning rate on Basic fares, why would anyone book them with cash (instead of points) if the points are refunded with no strings attached?

This seems unclear to me as well. I hope they clarify soon

Do we know for sure that the Basic fare type will even be bookable with points...?

Could this be the next screwing that is coming?

To redeem points you have to book the Anytime or Business Select? They better clarify this, and fast.

I would assume that WN will be offering awards in Basic. Note that DL has BE awards as long as flights are 100% DL metal (and there are BE revenue fares on route). Any awards that include at least one partner flight are only offered as higher mileage Main awards (they do sell revenue BE fares on partner metal, they just don't offer BE awards on them). DL BE awards are supposed to be subject to 9900 mile (US/Canada), 19900 mile (international) deductions for redeposits, but there have been a number of reports that they haven't actually been making deductions on redeposits. These are similar to $99/$199 cancel fees on DL revenue BE fares. Below are example one-way awards. Most DL TATL awards have a roundtrip booking requirement for cheapest awards, just as cheapest revenue fares have roundtrip booking requirements on TATL routes. Note that neither BE, nor Comfort+ awards are offered on partner metal (while they show as Sold Out, the reality is they are never offered).

Ok. And AA and UA awards book into main. Who knows what will happen with WN.

Well we will see what they do.

I guess we can all enjoy "how it has been" until May 28.

Well, except the only 2x earn on WGA travel purchased. But that is okay. Given many of us will be doing less business with Southwest in the future anyway, what do the points even matter?

I heard the same thing on this forum about people not flying Southwest after their 2022 Christmas meltdown. It turned out, people returned. The program will be tweeked as Southwest gains knowledge and has to compete with other airlines based on product and cost. For customers like myself who value non-stop flights from smaller cities, Southwest will still be my primary carrier. The current model wasn't generating the profit margin that Alaska, Delta, and United enjoy.

I hope the tweakers at Southwest restore non-expiration of funds. That's the one change which clearly imposes much more costs on the customer than any benefit to Southwest.

The benefit to Southwest is it ideally helps their balance sheet (lowers liabilities) to expire the funds sooner. Ideally because they will be able to realize greater breakage (customers who lose funds since they expire) faster. Now if every customer still spends their funds... then this little scheme fails. But you know many people will end up losing funds due to expiration.

No way, Thar's too much gold in those hills.

Which got me thinking, why are these funds apparently exempt from escheatment laws?

I just got $50 back from the State for a Marriott credit I must of had 20 years ago.

I would think because credits from non-refundable fares would no longer be considered a person's property that is due to back to them (due to their non-refundable nature). Credits from a refundable fare that was not taken or refunded might be seen in a different light.