I’ve had the Southwest Companion Pass for quite some time now. I cannot remember exactly how long, but I believe it was in 2008ish. The past two years I had it due to signing up for two Southwest Airlines credit cards when they had the 50,000 point promotions after meeting the minimum spend requirements. Unfortunately, my companion pass earned that method expired December 31, 2013.
This time, I am taking a slightly different approach to earning my companion pass for 2014 and 2015. Over the past two and a half years I’ve accumulated Wyndham Reward points for very cheap!
- American Express Daily Getaways: In 2011 and 2012 I purchased Wyndham Reward points during one of the daily getaway packages for about .3 cents a point. In 2013 the cost of purchasing these points was significantly higher and while possibly a good value for some, I did not need to purchase any more especially at the higher rate.
- Wyndham’s 16,000 Point Promotion After One Stay: In 2012 Wyndham offered a promotion where you’d earn 16,000 points after one stay at a participating hotel. You were allowed to earn up to 48,000 bonus points. Wyndham offered this promotion twice during the year. And one of the best things with the Wyndham program is that even if you do not check in you still get the points (as long as the hotel doesn’t cancel your reservation).
Price paid for these points:
- American Express Daily Getaways: I cannot recall exactly how much I paid in total, but it was somewhere around $650ish for about 250,000 points.
- Wyndham’s Promotion: I “stayed” 5 times during this promotion and earned a total of 80,000 bonus points plus an additional 12,974 points from the stays (for the regular point earnings and different promotions at the time). I also earned 5,400 Southwest points for those stays as well as some of the nights I credited to miles and not points. For this, I paid around $300.
Overall, I still paid about close to $1,000 to earn 337,364 Wyndham Reward points. All along though, I knew my goal was to use these points to transfer them to Southwest Rapid Reward points. On January 1, 2014, I transferred 336,000 Wyndham Reward points to Southwest at a rate of 8,000 Wyndham points = 2,400 Southwest points. Once the transfer goes through, this will credit me 100,800 points to my Southwest account. (note: Wyndham has changed the transfer ratio to require double the number of Wyndham points for the same amount of Southwest points). Since you need 110,000 points to earn the companion pass, I will be purchasing $10,000 worth of Vanilla Reload cards at CVS with my Southwest credit card over the next few weeks.
As of right now, those 100,000 Southwest points are equal to $1,680 in Southwest travel. Starting on March 31, 2014, however, they will be equal to $1,440. Even after the devaluation, my $1,000 was well spent as I will receive at least $440 MORE towards Southwest travel and a companion can fly with me FOR FREE (plus the $2.50 segment fee) for all of 2014 and 2015.
The Wyndham site does state that it takes 6-8 weeks for points to post to partner accounts, however, my transferred points only took about 4 days. In my account, it shows that all transferred points from Wyndham counted towards my companion pass status! I am 92% there!
This post is just a reminder that there are many ways unique ways to earn the Southwest Companion pass. You can check out some other ways to earn the Southwest Airlines companion pass here.
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Thanks for this information. This year is the first year I have the SW companion pass, but I was wondering how to get one without applying for the credit cards again. I might use these strategies for next year!
Nice post. I also transferred hotel points (Club Carlson in my case) to get 29k SWA. I had a lot of points from the Club Carlson big night giveaways. I had one 50k sign up bonus, and made the rest on real and VR spend.
To be clear, these transferred points will count toward a CP, but not status. Correct?
I went with a hybrid method. I used one SW credit card app plus 100k UR>Hyatt points to get to CPQ. Worth it to me, 23 month of Companion Pass……
I got my first SWA companion pass in November and have used it a total of 0 times. Luckily I still have 11 months to figure out my companion’s schedule and go on a trip. Hopefully everyone else is taking advantage of the SWA companion pass.
I will be getting mine soon, just waiting for the statements to close on the two Southwest CCs. Already transferred 10K points to 4,800 points from Hyatt and it was posted in a few days.
My CP came from the old two credit cards plus spend and transfer of Choice Rewards points. For anybody with older parents who live in a different state, it is a great help to have this available. My wife and I have made emergency runs using points and pass half a dozen times in the last 11 months-and are only half way through the CP. Also, please don’t forget the Chase Air Tran card as another source of 2 short term flights on Air Tran or Southwest. Thanks for the “CP renewal” tips.
I’m trying the Marriott Vacation Package route.DH and I have 145,000 Marriott points between us. Just applied for the Ink Plus and will transfer the 55k points to Marriott. That will give me 200k points to redeem gor a Vacation Package which will give me 7 nights + 100k SW miles. For the last 10k miles I need, I also applied for the (currently crappy) Best Western CC and will transfer the 20k points to SW. I also transferred 18k AMEX reward points to Choice which I will then transfer to SW. Between Best Western and Amex, I will have my last 10k SW miles.
We used the Companion Pass 5 times in 2012/2013 and I am in love with it. So cheap for quick weekend getaways anywhere in the US. Absolutely perfect for couple getaways.