Skip to main content

Southwest Airlines Community

Helpful Tip to reach Companion Pass Points before December 31, 2020

SWFlyer007
Aviator C

As the end of the year approaches and people are still a bit reluctant to fly when all seats open on December 1st.  Here is what I plan to do that will help secure my companion pass for all of 2021.  I post this because it might help you as well.  Since you only have 2 months left for a credit card billing cycle, you will need to do these things:

 

1) If it isn't already, move your billing cycle date towards the end of the 3rd week of the month.  Mine is always on the 26th.  (Because of FEB)

 

2) For the next two months, purchase flights that you may use, most will not be used before December 31st, (You get double points on flight purchases) 

 

3) About a week prior to the flight, cancel the trip and have the money go into your travel funds to be used one year from when you purchased the tickets.  (Because SWA doesn't charge you for any changes and cancelation, you get the full amount of the ticket forwarded to your account) 

 

Since I'm sitting at 121,117 points of the 125,000. I need 3,883 points to get next year's companion pass.   I can conceivably do this and not have to fly another flight since I put other charges on my card, (grocery shopping, car gas, insurance, home electric, phone, home gas, home water, and XMAS shopping)  

 

This has worked for me for multiple years.  One year I put everybody's shopping charges of over 12,000 on my card to build up the points from it and they repaid me, but I got that companion.  It's worked for me and I hope this might help somebody else out.  if there are other tips that people know of without having to get a credit card, please post them.  I do suggest you cancel your flight at least a week prior to the trip to give SWA a full opportunity of selling that seat, please. 

2 REPLIES 2

Re: Helpful Tip to reach Companion Pass Points before December 31, 2020

TheMiddleSeat
Aviator A

Every year people miss out on earning CP because they fail to realize points are posted when the statement closes, not when the purchase is made.  This a good reminder to be mindful of your statement closing date.

 

--TheMiddleSeat

Re: Helpful Tip to reach Companion Pass Points before December 31, 2020

SWFlyer007
Aviator C

@TheMiddleSeat   Yes, this is very true.  I've adjusted to the 26th because in watching my points I've seen that it will 95% of the time be posted in 3 days, thus the 29 or 30, (for those months of 30)  Fortunately, Dec is 31 days.   I've adjusted it down from the 28, for a while, and the 27th, and found this to be a safe bet.  But if you want to be totally sure, when I had it on the 24th, it always was posted by the end of the month in any month, including, FEB.  But FEB is irrelevant because it really doesn't matter if that month is posted in March or not.