Skip to main content

Southwest Airlines Community

Points subscription service

bwallet
Frequent Flyer A

I can't find a link on the Southwest page, but lots of places (https://thepointsguy.com/news/southwest-subscription-program/) are reporting a Rapid Rewards subscription service where you get points per month plus quarterly bonuses. The math on this is atrocious. They are selling points over a year period at a best case scenario of at 1.78 centers per point. Seriously? So many questions...

 

Is Southwest an airline or a point selling service? That's been a question for quite a while with all the airlines given how they push credit cards, but this is a bit too much.

 

Given that points represent a liability on the balance sheet, will this not make devaluing points again to improve the books all the more tempting?

 

How stupid are people that they would buy into this system? Why not just set the money aside and buy the tickets for less and earn more points? What is Southwest saying about the intellectual capabilities of its customers???

18 REPLIES 18

Re: Points subscription service

dfwskier
Aviator A

Many people here agree that buying points is a bad deal - the possible exception being  to buy a small number to combine with your other points to buy a ticket.

 

Ther e are many far better ways of getting points.

Re: Points subscription service

jksobonya
Aviator A

I've never heard of this Points subscription program until now. It sounds like a new program Southwest is offering. 

 

On the Buy, Gift, and Transfer points page there is an option for a "Points Subscription" - https://www.southwest.com/rapidrewards/points-center?clk=GSUBNAV-RR-BUYPOINTS 

 

When you click Point Subscription, you can view the plans, but you have to be logged into your account to view the plans: https://www.southwest.com/account/rapidrewards/points/buy-promo-2?clk=5799092&cbid=5799092 

 

There's a 30,000 point plan, a 40,000 point plan, and a 80,000 point plan. These plans are better than just buying points directly, so you would save money on the plan vs buying 30,000 points outright. For the 30,000 plan, you're paying $51.56 a month, for the 40,000, $64.16 a month, for the 80,000, $119.16 a month.

 

Doing the math, you're paying $618.72 for 30,000 points using the subscription program. If you were to buy the points directly and not on this subscription program, you'd be paying over $900 for the same amount of points, according to the Buy Points page. 

 

So if you needed to buy a lot of points for whatever reason, the Subscription program would save you money vs the normal way of buying points. 

 

I think the only caveat is that on the subscription program, you are awarded the points throughout the year, while if you bought 30,000 points directly, you would get them all at once. 

 

--Jessica

Re: Points subscription service

bwallet
Frequent Flyer A

The subscription service is cheaper than buying the points outright, but it is more expensive than just buying the tickets. Quite a bit more expensive. 

Re: Points subscription service

dfwskier
Aviator A

@bwallet wrote:

The subscription service is cheaper than buying the points outright, but it is more expensive than just buying the tickets. Quite a bit more expensive. 


Correct, and that is why it seldom makes sense to buy a lot of points.

Re: Points subscription service

TheMiddleSeat
Aviator A

I saw this program in an email the other day and cringed.  Never buy points!

Now we can wait for the community posts by people who bought into this program thinking it was a good deal and realize they got ripped off.

 

--TheMiddleSeat

Re: Points subscription service

jksobonya
Aviator A

I don't agree with "never" buying points though. In the past I've purchased points in small amounts, for example when I need just a few thousand to get a free flight with a points purchase. To me that's worth it and I don't feel like it's a waste of money - I saved more money with the points purchase getting a free flight than I would have buying the flight at regular retail. 

 

Still, I'm not saying the subscription program is something I'd ever use. I don't need to burn that amount of money on points 😂 but others may not feel the same way. People will use the subscription program who have money to burn for the convenience of getting a decent amount of points throughout the year - for doing nothing. Think of the SWA credit card agreements many sign up for to get 40,000 bonus points or whatever it is - you often have to spend thousands of dollars on the credit card to get those points. This is much more convenient than that (and it won't mess with your credit). I'll be interested to see who buys into it.  

 

--Jessica

Re: Points subscription service

TheMiddleSeat
Aviator A

Spending money on a credit card is not even remotely the same as just buying points.  With a credit card you are buying something else, you get to keep whatever that something is AND you get points for making the purchase with your credit card.  When you buy points you get nothing else besides the points.  Even making small purchases of points to top off your account to allow you to redeem points for a flight makes me shake my head, but I understand why people do it.

 

--TheMiddleSeat

Re: Points subscription service

jksobonya
Aviator A

I don't know, I just saw someone post about a CC offer for 30,000 points and they had to spend $5,000 on the card to get the points. Compare that with the subscription program. With the subscription, you are paying less than $1,000 to get 30,000 points. If I had to pick between getting a credit card (and potentially getting into debt using it) or signing up for a subscription program to get points, I'd sign up for the subscription program.

 

--Jessica

Re: Points subscription service

bwallet
Frequent Flyer A

@jksobonya Presumably, that's $5k that they would have spent anyhow. They just spent it on a different credit card. 

 

Personally, when I read what people do to get (and re-get) these credit card bonuses, I cringe. 30k points is worth maybe $360. I won't be elitist and say that that is very little money, but I'm amazed at the hoops people jump through to get eligible sometimes. I've stopped reading he Chase UR Points group on Flyertalk because it is annoying.