You seem to be ovelooking that WN plans on adding international partners, even beyond WestJet and Volaris, so there definitely was a need to "retool" the program to some extent no matter what (though it didn't necessarilly have to be as drastic as what is rumored in this thread) and there will be more aspirational awards available in the future.

I only fly about 12 times a year. I get my WN credits to achieve CP from CC spend and rental cars mostly.

And by pounding Choice Privileges and Amtrak/CO when they misprice the conversion.

I'd rather have a couple thousand tax-free a year in free Companion tix for my son than a few hours going somewhere in F. As I understand it, it's somewhat hard to get upgrades on UA/AA out of Chicago anyway.

If WN goes to a system more like UA/AA/CO, etc., since they don't have F or int'l flights at the moment, they will surely have to offer some sort of setup where we can engage in "credit runs," so I'll move in that direction.

One time, IIRC, overnight without warning and the other time only by the good fortune of someone in the Choice forum stumbling across it with a week's notice and posting the news on FT. Choice lied by saying they'd sent out emails announcing the latter devaluation.

I think it would be wise for them to have some "aspirational" awards -- although it didn't work out too well when they had ATA and Hawaii. ;)

As it stands now, only VERY frequent flying leisure travellers can earn a reward. As I said, you need 8 roundtrips in 2 years (or be a frequent traveller who is anal-retentive about crediting their RR account for car rentals and hotels). I do that, but I don't know many other people in the non-cyber world who do. :) I would think the VAST majority of pax who qualify for WN rewards have at least SOME business travel, where they presumably pay more for their tickets. Which leads me to conclude that WN is not currently giving the store away. If they become less generous, they could easily lose some of their more loyal customers. It will have no impact whatsoever on infrequent flyers.

For where we go most often (#1 STL, #2 CHI) WN rules on price alone. They are the major factor in keeping prices down so the legacy carriers don't fleece us. I won't be too happy about any negative changes to RR but I intend to be objective about it. i knew from day 1 that RR 2.0 was coming.

TrueBlue 2 has been launched. Check out initial reactions in this thread and on this page.

TB2 appears to yield about a 10% rebate, give or take 50%. JetBlue's original TrueBlue program had distance-dependent earning, so JetBlue's short-haul customers are not facing a massive devaluation as Southwest's customers will.

"The success or failure of monkey see monkey do is to watch the right monkey"
 

Actually, at least three things are happening in the relevant world simultaneously... JetBlue just announced its new program, WestJet just announced that it will announce its new program at the end of the month, and JetBlue and Lufthansa just announced a big partnership. (OT: One less potential Southwest international partner to spill speculation about. :p)

The third one is of particular new interest for this discussion, though. It's going to be interesting to see how JetBlue's new FF program will interface with Lufthansa's Miles & More. (And particularly if one speculates that this partnership is a step in a long range plan of Lufthansa's. Think another JetBlue winter debacle for running even thinner than before. Think the German manifest destiny world view vis a vis Lufthansa Italia and "british" midland. To be specific, what might LH be telling JetBlue re JetBlue's new m.o.?) But then, both initiatives have been in the works for a while, and JetBlue is still moving forward with both. The point is that a note of uncertainty has been introduced re JetBlue's new program.

By the way, when this discussion lines up JetBlue and Southwest for comparison, gauging JetBlue's success attributable to their new m.o. as a bellweather for another new Rapid Rewards model, keep in mind that JetBlue also covers the "aspirational award" category discussed here (to a considerably greater degree, at present) with its flights to the Carribean - and Burlington :p - and now with Lufthansa's world view -- er, coverage.

Would it be taking Messrs. Kelly and Ford at their word (e.g., offering greater flexibility and offering the Customer the "opportunity" to give Southwest more money) to guess that they might be talking about a "miles + $ model"? See Continental's weekly specials for a simple rendering of it. So managed, it certainly would adhere to Southwest's signature KISS m.o., and perhaps there's a way to eke out some more cash without upsetting either us or the Kettles.

Apologies if this has been covered earlier in the thread - but can anyone enlighten me on this: I am charging up a storm to earn my first CP. I think I can squeeze together 100 credits by the end of April. If RR2.0 does not release before then, should I expect to be able to have a CP for 12 months or am in at risk of having the CP revoked just after I earn it? Any insight would be much appreciated.

I don't think anyone envisions WN will prematurely discontinue the CP for anyone who's already earned it. Also, FYI, your CP will be valid for a minimum of 13 months (renewals are valid for exactly 13 months).

Big Oops
 

Everyone, please accept my apologies for a major oversight. For 18 months, since post number 7, I have been under the mistaken impression that the Companion Pass was mentioned in that post. However it was not.

I have other copies of the survey from other sources, and they match post number 7, so I didn't read it closely. The other copies mention the Companion Pass as continuing essentially unchanged. I thought everyone here knew, but only I had the information. How embarrassing.

The survey text is as follows:
At about 5 points per dollar, this would be $11,000 of travel. However the top elite level has 100% bonus, cutting the requirement to $5,500. Credit card points will cut it further, but we don't yet know the credit card earning rate. If it's one point per dollar, plenty of people will line up to spend $55,000 and earn a companion pass. I'm guessing half a point per dollar, making the necessary credit card spend about the same as it is now.

Remember, with the last revamp of RR, all existing rewards were grandfathered. I would be completely shocked if this weren't the case with this likely devaluation.

Well said.

Considering this thread is 18 months old, is there anything in the wind recently that RR 2.0 is coming soon?

As I would guess, the announcement would likely need to be made a few months before effective date -- so looks like early summer at the earliest??

My personal guess is fall or winter. Moving to RR 2.0 is not a high priority at Southwest, thank goodness. Yes, there will be adequate notice.

Rapid Rewards 2.0 is the subject of today's blog entry over at Crankyflier.com

Southwest Looks at Revamping Rapid Rewards, Adding Same Day Standby Rules