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Travel Funds

mhemm06
Explorer C

Question --

 

Had travel plans to go out of town for both Thanksgiving and Christmas 2020. Had flights booked by July 2020, ended up getting pregnant in October and per our doctor's recommendations we cancelled our flights shortly thereafter (obviously missing the 9/7/20 cutoff).  So our travel funds were only extended to July 3, 2021.  We want to make plans to travel Christmas 2021.  Is our only option to wait for these funds to expire then try to ask for an extension and incur the $100 fee per traveler? (hopefully this explanation and question makes sense). For example if we have 3 flight funds that total $420, we will only get $320 back in travel funds, correct? That's if they are willing to extend the expiration date. 

 

I am super frustrated with Southwest and why they aren't being a little more flexible with extending considering Covid isn't even resolved yet. And most other airlines are extending further out into 2022! 

4 REPLIES 4

Re: Travel Funds

dfwskier
Aviator A

The fee is $100 per travel fund, not $100 per traveler.

 

So you need to use those three funds to buy on ticket, and then cancel that ticket. That will give you one travel fund.

 

travel funds may be converted by contacting customer relations after the fund expires but no later than six months after the expiration date. The resulting voucher is valid for six months and is  valid for use by Any one.

Re: Travel Funds

adoannie
Explorer C

I agree. This is very frustrating. I just got off a call regarding the same situation. I have over $100 on one of my travel funds and it expires next month and they said the same thing to me. 

 

I am a frequent flier on SouthWest and it makes no sense that they are extending points etc. but our actual money that was spent is going to expire. If anything SouthWest should turn them into reward points that can be used or extend the travel funds without taking $100. 

Re: Travel Funds

dfwskier
Aviator A

 The airline did allow passengers to convert travel funds to RR points last year. The program ended on 12/15.

 

actually paying $100 to save the rest as a voucher is a better deal than any other airline will give you. The others keep all of your money .

Re: Travel Funds

TheMiddleSeat
Aviator A

@dfwskier wrote:

 The airline did allow passengers to convert travel funds to RR points last year. The program ended on 12/15.

 


The conversion could only be done with travel funds that had been extended to 2022 and that extention could only be done earlier in the year.

 

I too had holiday travel booked and remained optimistic that I would be able to travel therefore I didn't cancel when the extension was available and ended up with travel funds that expired in Feb 2021. Southwest did in a way punish flyers who had hoped to be able to complete holiday travel, but canceled as the date got closer as compared to people that canceled plans much earlier in the year. I've expressed frustration about this several times in my conversations with Southwest.

 

The only option now is to pay the $100 per travel fund after expiration. If a single traveler has multiple funds be sure to combine them before they expire by booking, then canceling a flight for the value of the combined funds. This will give you a single travel fund to reinstate.

 

--TheMiddleSeat