Chase has added a number of benefits to the Southwest line of cards:
- New bonus category on all personal and business cards: earn 2x points on Local transit and Commuting, including Rideshare (previously this category was the regular 1x)
- New bonus category on all three personal cards: earn 2x points on Internet, Cable, Phone services, and select Streaming (previously this category was the regular 1x); we don’t yet have a clear definition of what’s included in the Streaming category.
- All cards besides Plus (personal and business) got an extra 1x points earned on Southwest purchases:
- The Premier cards and the Priority card now earn 3x instead of 2x
- The Business Performance card now earns 4x instead of 3x
- The Plus and Premier personal and business cards get a new benefit of 2 earlybird check-ins per year.
- All cards besides Plus (personal and business) earn 1,500 tier qualifying points towards A-List status for every $10,000 spent, with no limit on the amount of TQPs you can earn (previously this was limited to 15,000 TQPs per year).
- All business cards get a $500 fee credit for Rapid Rewards transfers. When you use your card to transfer points to another Rapid Rewards Member, fees associated with the transfer will be reimbursed, up to $500 in statement credits per anniversary year.
- All cards besides Performance Business now get 25% back on in-flight purchases.
Looks like it’s just enhancements with no downside which is cool. Simplified image below. They’ve also added 100,000 points signup bonuses on the personal cards. And they’ve increased the referral bonuses to 20,000 for the referrer.
I used our Southwest Plus card in March for EarlyBird checkin. I was charged and then credited $40. Used it again a week ago and was charged $50 and credited $10. Chase is insisting there is a $50 maximum per year.
I was curious if the early bird credit is right away or if we have to wait until our next annual fee is paid like for the $50 hotel credit on the Sapphire preferred card. And like mentioned already, does it need to be done as a separate transaction?
Found my answer here; https://creditcards.chase.com/a1/southwest/AEP100kPlus1021?CELL=6PMC&clk=6339042&cbid=6339042, Each anniversary year, one-way, per Passenger, can be purchased as part of the original flight purchase or added to a flight after purchase.
Are you taking this to mean we do have to wait until our card anniversary?
So does this mean it’s credited every anniversary or every billing cycle that Early Bird is purchased? Still confused at what you found.
See this plus the new 100k bonuses, my first thoughts are, is a devaluation coming?
I think that’s just Chase switching strategies, they seem to have bumped SUBs on several cards in the past year, but also significantly increased MSR and time to meet it. They basically want to stay as a primary card in average person’s wallet for as long as they can.
If only they allowed the cashing out of points as gift cards again.
That’s Southwest, not Chase.
Probably should read, “besides Plus” instead of “besides for Plus”
Updated
Any idea when the early check ins would land in our accounts?…. Or is it a credit?
You likely prepay for early bird and then you get statement credit for each one. That is how it works with the Priority benefit of Upgraded Boardings.
To clarify this a tiny bit, with the other cards you have to pay at the boarding gate. You can’t just “prepay” online, FYI for others mostly.
But – since early board by design is done LONG before getting to the airport, gonna guess this might be different that buying the a1-a15.
That’s because you can’t buy Upgraded Boarding online. You can only buy Early Bird online.
That’s the big difference. Early Bird is the early version, while Upgraded Boarding is the last minute version.
There’s also a slight difference in what boarding number you get, and that’s why the higher-end card gives Upgraded Boarding, because it gives you an even earlier boarding number than Early Bird does (but not by that much).
But what’s not clear is whether you get the credit if you buy Early Bird in the same purchase as the ticket, or only if you buy Early Bird as a separate purchase. (Ie, it’s not clear whether Chase can see that you bought Early Bird if you didn’t buy it as a stand-alone purchase.) So we have to see the details from Chase to knows exactly how Early Bird benefit works.
you can find the answer in the Offer Details for the card in the Early Bird Check-in Section: https://creditcards.chase.com/travel-credit-cards/southwest/plus