88. Southwest Rapid Rewards is Changing: Here’s What You Need to Know with Lyn Mettler

Welcome to Point Me to First Class, the only show for employed professionals, entrepreneurs, and business owners who are looking to optimize their higher-than-average expenses to travel the world. I'm your host, Devon Gimbel, and I believe that your expenses are your greatest untapped asset if you know how to leverage them. Ready to dive into the world of credit card points and miles so you can travel more, travel better, and travel often? Let's get started.

Devon: Hello, everyone, and welcome back to the Point Me to First Class podcast. On today's episode, we are going to be taking a closer look at Southwest Airlines. Known for their low-cost fares, generous free baggage policy, and coveted companion pass, Southwest is a popular airline that services more than 100 destinations across the United States, Mexico, Central America, and the Caribbean. 

Southwest and their Rapid Rewards program are known for doing things a little bit differently than their domestic airline counterparts, and they recently garnered a lot of attention with the announcement of some upcoming changes that will go into effect in 2025. I've invited Southwest expert Lyn Mettler back to the podcast to take a closer look at these changes, including what to expect, how they might impact your future travel experiences on the airline, and who stands to benefit from these changes the most.

Lyn is a longtime travel journalist for the U.S. News and World Report, the Today Show, MSN, and others, and has been writing about travel and interviewing experts for years. In 2015, she discovered how to fly her family of four free to all the places she'd been writing about, going from one car trip a year to flying free six times a year around the United States, Europe, and the Caribbean. Because the system worked so well and was so simple, she knew she had to share it with others.

Through her Families Fly Free podcast and membership, she now teaches hundreds of families this same simple system. Now, I don't know anybody who knows more about the Southwest Airlines Rapid Rewards programs, how to use your points on Southwest, or just generally how to take advantage of all this airline has to offer than Lyn. So, Lyn, I am so thrilled to have you back on the podcast today to talk about these changes with Southwest Airlines, what we can expect. Thank you so much for being here. 

Lyn: Sure. Happy to talk about it. There's a lot of exciting things coming on Southwest. 

Devon: All right. We are going to get to all of that. But before we dive into what some of those changes are, can you just kick us off by describing what it is that you love about the Rapid Rewards program and what you think it really offers to people in the points and miles space? 

Lyn: Yeah, for me, what's most important is to get to as many places and bring as many people with me for free as possible. I think Southwest is the best airline to do that. I've been working with their system for almost 10 years now, and you're able to fly them for so many fewer points per flight than you can on any other airline.

There's a lot of different tricks and tips and things you can play with the way their system works that allows you to really work that price down. So that fits in very well with my goal of how many places can we get and can we bring the whole family and more with us for the ride? 

Devon: Yeah, absolutely. You mentioned that the value proposition that they offer, especially compared to using points and miles on some of the other domestic airlines. We think about United Airlines or Delta, American Airlines. Can you give us some examples of some of the great deals that you have found flying on Southwest Airlines? How many points it's taken you to fly to certain places with your family? 

Lyn: Yeah. So one of my favorite ones I like to mention is getting four of us to Hawaii for 30,000 points. On the regular, I would say we can get things down to 5,000, 7,500, 10,000 points round trip per person. It may not be that published price that you see right off the top. You need to grab the flight and then there's different ways to work it down. 

The big one that they've always done and that's so easy to do is once you book your flight is to always check and see if the price has gone down. You do the best booking in points with that because their points never expire. So you get your points put right back into your account if the price has gone down. Just doing that one thing alone, I mean, we save tens of thousands of points every year. I'm sort of obsessed with checking it every day, but it doesn't take very long to look in the app when you're standing in line or taking a walk or something to check and see if the price has drop. 

Devon: Yeah, I agree. I think that's one of the things that makes the Rapid Rewards program so strong, especially compared to some of the other options that are out there. But as I mentioned a little bit earlier, Southwest is known kind of for doing things differently in general. For folks who are not as familiar with flying Southwest in general, what do you think are some of the biggest differences in just the flying experience when folks book on Southwest versus when they book on other airlines? 

Lyn: Well, Southwest is a fantastic airline to deal with. It would be a whole different scene for me if they had terrible customer service. There are some airlines, Frontier. Even if I could fly them free every day of the year, I would not because they are so unpleasant to deal with. Most of the time Southwest is fantastic. So they're known, of course, for having their funny flight attendants. Yeah, they mess up but every airline does at some point. I think generally they handle it very well. They usually do try to make up for whatever problem you've experienced. So that's, of course, one thing.

But they have the two free checked bags per person. Thank goodness they're not going to change that. There are rumors that that might be changing. So they have made it clear there's no change to that. You can also cancel and rebook. You can change your flight with no change fees, no cancel fees. A lot of the airlines, I think, have done away with that since the pandemic. But they have never had those in place.

So that really just gives you particularly, again, when you're booking in points, and I work a lot with families. So it gives you the peace of mind. Like if something happens and you need to cancel a flight, you're not going to have any cancel fee. If you booked in points, your points are going to go right back into your account. No problem. They never expire. You can cancel up to 10 minutes before the flight departs. That is just total peace of mind that if something happens, someone gets sick, you need to change plans. It's just not a big deal. 

The other benefit of that is you can also grab cheap fares when you see them and then cancel them if you're not going to end up taking the trip. But I always tell people you can't get the cheap fare later when it's not there. Grab it now. Again, you can wait very close and see if you want to cancel it. It's not a big deal. So I think those are some of the big set of parts in the way Southwest does things differently. Of course, that they don't have assigned seats. 

Devon: Yes. So let's talk about more what that experience is like for people who have never flown Southwest before. How does this work? What can people expect as part of this no assigned seating policy that has traditionally been how Southwest has operated? 

Lyn: Yeah. This is probably the number one objection that I get to people being willing to fly Southwest is it causes anxiety, I think, to not know for sure where you're going to be sitting. Now, those of us who have been flying them for a long time, we've figured out pretty good how to do this so that a lot of it is families worrying about not being able to sit with their kids, which I totally get. I was in that situation myself. 

I always say they're never going to let kids sit by themselves. I mean, if that were to ever happen, it would be rare. You would just ask the flight attendant to please ask someone to switch with you so you and your child can sit together. But basically, the way it works is you're given a boarding order based on when you check in for your flight. The general public can check in 24 hours ahead of time. 

So as fast as you can hit the check-in button on your phone or your computer or whatever is the boarding order that you get. So based on when you board the plane is when you get your pick of seat. So there's three boarding groups: A, B, and C. If you're in C, you're probably going to have some trouble. You might end up in a middle seat, probably in the back of the plane. A or B, you're probably going to be fine. 

There's different ways you can mitigate that. You can buy the opportunity to get an early boarding order and these different types of things. But that's how it works right now. 

Devon: Yeah, and compared to other airlines, correct me if I'm wrong because I do not frequently fly Southwest because they don't operate a lot of flights in and out of my home airport. But my understanding is that especially compared to some other airlines, Southwest doesn't offer the same sort of range of seating options as you might expect on some other airlines.

So, yes, you have the very typical kind of three seats in economy configuration, but there's no domestic first-class product. As far as I understand, there's no sort of priority seating where there's seats even within economy that right now offer a lot of extra legroom or offer location closer to the front of the airplane. So once you're on the plane, basically all the seats are equal just in terms of their size and kind of what you have access to. Am I wrong about that? 

Lyn: No, that's exactly right. All the seats are the same on Southwest. So they do have business fares that you can buy, but it basically gets you an earlier boarding order and a free drink. I don't know. That, to me, it's not very appealing, I wouldn't think, to business travelers. I think they are, as they're shifting here, trying to appeal a little bit more to that segment. Yeah, but there's no first class. 

Really, your only shot at getting a better seat is to get in the emergency row. So that's what everybody goes for if they have an early boarding order. We've even had the first boarding order, and we still didn't get the emergency row because the flight coming in had people staying on the plane. Of course, they just moved to the emergency row while waiting for everyone to board. So you're really not even guaranteed even if you're the first person to board the plane. 

So that's where having an assigned seat would be helpful because then you would know. Like, my husband is tall. So, if it is a longer flight, he is very uncomfortable in the traditional legroom seat. So he is thrilled that he could now know for sure that he would have enough legroom.

Devon: Yeah I was reading online that you mentioned that the number one objection that you hear from folks around flying Southwest is specifically this traditional no seating policy that they have had. I saw a stat online. I actually don't know for sure if this is true or not. But it said that, according to a Southwest survey, 80% of customers identified that particular policy of Southwest as the one they most wanted to change. Now, as someone who does frequently fly Southwest, and as you mentioned, you help a lot of families fly Southwest, does that sound about right to you? 

Lyn: I think that is the number one reason people don't fly them. I mean, that and the number two would be like you're saying they just don't fly a lot of out of your home airport and/or they don't fly nonstops from your home airport. I have to work with people to get over this whole nonstop thing. Like, would you rather fly for free, or do you mind taking a connection here or there? 

But I think this is a really smart move on their part to move to assigned seating because that totally makes. I could have told them this years ago. People want this. I think that's the way they're going to start to pick up some more revenue and get some of these people that aren't already flying Southwest to move over is having this assigned. That is the stat that they have cited when they're talking about making this shift. 

Devon: All right, so let's get into now what some of these changes are that we can all expect to come down the line for Southwest, I believe, starting next year. So it sounds like number one, they're getting rid of this no seating policy. I anticipate the impact of that change will be significant, both on sort of luring potentially new customers over to Southwest and also increasing satisfaction of their current customers. But can you talk a little bit more about what are some of the other changes that we can expect with Southwest Airlines coming up? 

Lyn: Well, in the assigned seating, so they're going to start selling tickets for that mid next year. Then the assigned seats will actually go into place in 2026. We don't have exact date yet. So you still got another year yet if you don't want to fly them for this reason of no assigned seating, but you will be able to start buying your tickets soon.

What they will be doing with that is they're not only adding assigned seats, but they're going to be adding a third of the plane will have extra legroom. So three to five inches of extra legroom. So, of course, that will be at, we don't have costs yet, but I'm sure that will be at a premium cost. What they're really working on is to increase profitability. So these moves we're seeing is how can they drive some additional revenue on top?

I think this is, again, it's a smart move. Those of us who fly for free and points, there's going to be some ways we can mitigate this. But some people may opt to just pay for the extra legroom seat. That's going to allow them to get a little bit of money out of us free flyers. Right? So that's one big thing. 

The next thing that I am super excited about is that they have said that we're going to be able to fly Icelandair using our Southwest Rapid Rewards points. So Icelandair does fly throughout Europe to all the major cities, Rome, London, Paris, et cetera. You would have to go through Iceland, stop on the way, which I'm good with. I haven't been to Iceland. Totally would love to see that. So that's very exciting because Southwest does not fly to Europe. They do fly internationally, but mostly throughout the Caribbean. You mentioned Central America to Costa Rica. 

So we don't know, again, exactly how this is going to work. But according to my calculations, if we were to get the same value out of our Southwest points that we do now on Icelandair, and we looked at the rates to fly to Europe on Icelandair right now, we'd be in the territory of 33,000 points round trip. 

They're going to be flying out of Baltimore, Washington is what they said to start with. That will start middle of 2025. Then they'll be adding some more departure airports after that point. So I think that's awesome. I would love to be able to use my points that way. 

What we don't know, and we haven't really talked about, but Southwest does have a companion pass where one person can fly with you for no airfare, no points, no dollars, just the taxes and fees for as long as you hold the pass anywhere you want to go. So how cool would it be if your companion could fly to Europe through Icelandair? So that's a big thing that they have announced. 

Now, they also said they're going to be partnering with some other airlines too. I think they said there would be one more announcement this year. There is a meeting coming up on November 6th. So we're hoping we might get some further details then. But they had a meeting in September where they really gave more details on all this, and they showed a map. 

They didn't verbally address any of this, but the map pointed to destinations in the South Pacific like Fiji. Best I could tell by trying to look at their map and look at a world map, that's what it looked like to me. So my guess is we would see some kind of airline next that flies into the South Pacific. So yes, please, I would like to go to Fiji.

Devon: That would be absolutely amazing. What other changes have they announced? 

Lyn: So those are the big ones. A lot of people want to know like what changes are coming to the Southwest cards. For those of us who hold the Southwest cards, they haven't given us any details on that. I don't think that's going to be any big deal. I think what's going to happen is the main perks we get on those cards are early boarding orders or the opportunity to check in ahead of everybody else. I think those are just going to become assigned seating selections in some way. That's the only shift I see happening there. I don't see any need to change anything else on the cards.

Status. So Southwest companion pass is actually considered an elite status with them. If you achieve enough points, then you can bring your companion with you for free. But then they have two other elite statuses, A-list and A-list Preferred. So it seems the only real change that will come with that is A-list Preferred will be able to choose an extra legroom seat at no additional cost. A-list would be able to choose an extra legroom seat if they're available 48 hours ahead of the flight. 

The way that planes are going to be laid out, we'll have this extra legroom. Then they're basically calling it front of plane standard legroom, back of plane standard legroom. So A-list would definitely be able to get the front of plane standard legroom. 

So when it comes to like using points to book Southwest. So I'm trying to take a look at how is this going to affect at least the strategy that I teach for how to do this. What we do know is that the cheapest fare, which is what I always teach people to book, want to get away, is not going to come with a seat selection. What's interesting here is the way we are right now, we can board, and we can pick a decent seat. We can at least attempt to get two and two together or maybe we can all sit together. We can probably choose: do we want an aisle or a window? 

If you get no seat selection, that's going to be way worse than the way it works now. I think then you're going to literally be stuck in the middle seat, not sitting next to anybody you know and probably in the back of the plane. So what I think is going to have to happen is we're going to need to book the next level fare, which is want to get away plus, and that one will come with a seat selection. It might not be a premium seat selection, but at least you'll be able to get to choose your seat. 

They have said if you do hold a companion pass, your companion will be able to get the seat selection next to you. So that should be fine. So I think that will take some more points, not a ton more points. But generally under my system, people have plenty of points to do what they want to do. They're flying six to ten times a year and bringing their whole families with them. So it might just be a slight strategy shift of going to that fare. 

I kind of like that fare because that fare also allows you, this is a new -- They added within the last year that for any fare types you can do standby. So basically you can get on an earlier flight if one is available that day. They have seats open, and you can do that at midnight on the day of your flight. 

Well, want to get away plus can do same day change. So you can change to before or after. So that's a nice feature, too, if you didn't end up picking the best flight that you would really like to take that day. Maybe it is a connection, and you'd prefer an on stop, or maybe it's later than you wanted to arrive or something. The day of, with that fare, if there's open seats, you can just move yourself to a better flight. So that's a nice kind of makes it travel a little nicer feature too. So that's really the only change that I anticipate. Until we get more details, I think that's probably going to be the main shift.

Devon: Yeah, I'm curious to hear from you with now the introduction of assigned seats. You mentioned that one of the potential drawbacks of this change policy is that for folks who don't either pay an increased fare or have some level of status that may allow them access to one of those, quote unquote, better seats to begin with, that the seats that are going to be available are going to be worse than they are now. I'm curious if with these changes that were announced, are there any other downsides that you're predicting or any other negative consequences of these changes? 

Lyn: I don't really see any other negative consequences. I think most of this is great. There are definitely some Southwest loyalists who are protesting against the assigned seating, but I think it's just a matter of its change. We're all used to, we've figured out the system the way it is now. As I said, if you know how to get an early boarding order, then you get to pick the better seat. But, yeah, that's really the only downside that I see to any of this. 

Generally, when they make big changes, they offer, like for example, companion pass. I should note too they keep talking about companion pass. I don't think we're going to see any changes to that unless it'll be every so often they increase the number of points you need to earn. So, for example, when they, I think it was two years ago, they went from 125,000 to 135,000. But when they did that, they made it so if you hold one of their cards, they will give you ten thousand points toward companion pass. So that basically did not affect us at all because that's how we teach earning companion pass. 

So usually try to get if there's a major change like that, they try to give some leeway, some sort of benefit or perk to people that are longtime flyers that are their Rapid Rewards members as a thank you to mitigate this change. I think they've learned because, again, there was this rumor that they would do away with the checked bags, and they did apparently also do a survey on that. 

I guess the results were please don't do away with the checked bags because that would be a tough one to swallow. We're very used to being able to check bags. But I mean, I think a lot of us, though, I definitely try to shift more to a carry on if I possibly can just post pandemic and seeing some of the lines to check bags at some airports over time, lost bags and all that stuff. 

Devon: Now, just from a personal perspective, I'm curious to hear which of the changes are you the most excited about and which one do you think is going to have just the biggest impact on Southwest flyers overall? 

Lyn: Well, I think this flying to Europe is that I am the most excited about that because that's definitely been a limitation on their part. I'd like to see them add Canada. That would be nice too. So maybe they need to partner with Canadian Airlines. You can get to a U.S. city that's close to the border. That's kind of the workaround. 

But they've never partnered with any airlines before. That's very new and different. They've kind of hinted that we may be able to earn Southwest points through partner alliances. So that could be a big change. They've also hinted at there's going to be continued new ways to earn Southwest points. That's always a good thing. 

Recently, they just kind of quietly put online the southwestcruises.com. Now, I'm not a cruising person, but a lot of my folks are. This is a way you earn points by booking a cruise through them. Just like we see these hotel sites where you can earn points by booking hotels through airlines. All the major cruise lines are on there. They will price match and send you back 110% refund if you find a better deal for the exact same things. That's kind of a no-brainer to me. If you like to cruise, you might as well earn some points to do that. 

So it's all going to give us opportunities to earn more points, to fly more places. That's just going to make them as an airline more appealing and better able to compete with Delta and United and American that already kind of function this way.

Another thing where they are different is how they don't really have traditional hubs like the other airlines do. So that'll be interesting to see if that's a shift they try to make because it does seem like they struggle to recover as fast when there's some sort of major weather problem, and particularly in areas where they do have a lot of flight attendants or flights coming out of that destination. 

Devon: Yeah, absolutely. That's a great point. I'm curious to hear more from you. With this partnership that Southwest has announced with Icelandair, you mentioned the way that it will work, at least in the beginning, is that folks would be able to fly a Southwest flight from wherever their origin is to Baltimore Airport and then Icelandair is going to be operating flights from Baltimore Airport then to their main airport in Reykjavik and potentially then beyond to other destinations throughout Europe.

What are some of the unknowns about this partnership right now? We're not totally clear about whether or not we're going to be able to use Southwest to be able to book flights all the way through to the endpoint destination. What else are we not sure about? 

Lyn: Yeah, I mean, they didn't explicitly say that, but I can't imagine that if you're able to fly Icelandair through Southwest that you can't go anywhere that they fly. So, I mean, I think we don't know how the value of the points are going to work, and we don't know if you'll be able to use your elite status and your companion pass. Certainly, it'll be a whole different assigned seating system and all of that. 

So, those are the things that remain to be resolved and what other destinations you'll be able to fly out of. I assume probably on the East Coast, but one area they really need to beef up is New York City, particularly if they're going to be flying to Europe because it seems to be the best city, the cheapest city to get over to Europe. They just fly into LaGuardia right now, and we like New York City. 

So I live in Indianapolis, and no non-stops to New York City. In fact, they have become out of the way. I'm willing to take a connection, but I'm not really willing to fly from Indianapolis to Dallas to New York City. If it's on the way, I'm in, but they need to figure that one out. 

So, I hope that next they do need to add some more non-stops. There are certain cities that, Detroit is one where I see a lot of people. They're Delta people because that's a Delta hub, but they are so used to flying Delta non-stop out of Detroit that it's hard to make that shift to Southwest. Atlanta is another one, but they did just drastically, they're going to cut. Southwest is cutting Atlanta significantly in terms of the number of destinations they fly to from Atlanta. But even with that, apparently, they're still the second largest airline in Atlanta after Delta. 

So, anyway, if they want to compete, I think they need to beef up their non-stops a little bit more and maybe shift around their network. We saw them at a lot of smaller airports during the pandemic, which was nice. There's a lot of airports you can fly into to get to national parks. A lot of our families want to do that, see as many national parks as possible, but I don't know if that's continually profitable. I would imagine not for them to keep flying into some of those really small airports, Bozeman, Montana, and smaller ones, ski destinations in Colorado and those types of things.

Devon: Yeah, I think that this announcement that Southwest is partnering with Icelandair to expand their route network, at least into Europe, is a really exciting one. It represents a huge shift for the airline, and the fact that they've also teased that there may be potential other partnerships coming up I think is really, really exciting. 

You mentioned that there was maybe a little hint or a suggestion that being able to fly Southwest along with a partner to the South Pacific may become a  possibility. I'm curious to hear from you if that is not the next partnership to be announced, do you have any guesses on a next airline that they may partner with, another airline sort of like Icelandair that maybe is known for also being more budget conscious, but in an international market?

Is there any kind of wish list airline that you would love to suggest? Because I'm sure everyone from Southwest is going to be listening to this podcast to get an interesting idea about where we need to go. 

Lyn: I know. They need to hire me as a consultant because their people are my people. I mean, Canada is definitely a big one. That's for sure one people have been asking for, and I hope that they would be looking at. Icelandair surprised me. I couldn't have come up with that one for sure. 

Beyond that something to South America might make sense because we're already as far as Costa Rica, and so it seems like there would be other destinations in that region that would be nice to be able to access or maybe even look to the top of South America. I think that'd be a great one. So that one wouldn't surprise me if they did something like that. 

South Pacific, I guess the connection there is since they've added Hawaii, and we can talk a little bit about that too. They're cutting Hawaii flights by 25%. Apparently that hasn't been as profitable as they hoped, which that surprises me too because most of the people that come to me, not most, a lot of people. First thing they want to do is take a bucket list trip to Hawaii. So I know that's high on a lot of people's list, and it became very affordable. 

I mean, we did it twice once they added Hawaii, and that was the first trips my whole family had done to Hawaii together. So, but I'm thinking since they've got Hawaii established now, that's an easier jump off point to get then to the South Pacific once you're there. So I don't know if Asia is a possibility since you'd be able to get over to maybe to Japan or something like that, but that'd be cool. My 16-year-old, Japan is on top of his list.

Devon: Yeah, I think it'll be really interesting to see if there are other budget airlines that Southwest ends up partnering with to expand their route network in a different direction. I think there are so many people right now who are really interested in those very budget conscious ways of traveling, especially if they can use their points to offset that cost.

So I think one of the things about the Southwest program in and of itself that, at least to me, has felt more limiting compared to other major airline frequent flyer programs is that their route network is not nearly as extensive, even especially kind of close in international as other airlines, and traditionally they have not had any partners. They have not been part of a traditional airline alliance where you could leverage those points even to build out more complicated itineraries or use your points to book partner flights on other airlines. 

So I think that is definitely, especially in the trends of folks who like to use points and miles to travel, that has been a huge limitation of Southwest Airlines. So it is exciting to think about what are the opportunities that exist even beyond this partnership with Icelandair moving forward to be able to extend their route network even farther. 

Now you touched a little bit on some of the Southwest credit cards earlier, but I'm curious to hear more of your opinion about right now, Southwest has five different credit cards that are issued all through Chase, right? There are three different personal credit cards and two different business credit cards. Those credit cards offer sort of differing levels of perks or benefits depending on how premium a credit card you're getting. 

Do we know yet whether or not any of these changes that Southwest has announced is going to impact at all any of the credit cards that it offers or the perks that are available through their credit cards? Or do you think this impacts at all people's Southwest credit card strategy moving forward? 

Lyn: I don't think it's going to impact the credit card strategy because at least from my perspective, it's all about using those to get companion pass. If they don't change companion pass or the number of points, even if they change it by 10,000 points, not a big deal. That's not going to change the strategy. So I think it just comes down to which cards do you want to have and why. 

I usually advise people, again, you said the three personal, either you're budget conscious and you just want to go for the cheap annual fee one, which is $69, doesn't really come with many perks, or you go for the one with all the perks. I like the ones with all the perks because I like the boarding orders that they give you, particularly with the no assigned seats right now.

The highest annual fee personal card comes to $75 travel credit. It's a $149 annual fee. It's very easy to use that $75 travel credit for when you're traveling internationally on Southwest, you have the higher taxes and fees coming back into the country. You can use it to cover those. You can use it to buy these earlier check-ins and those types of things. 

They have also, again, with the no assigned seat part of things, they've increased the ceiling of what the cost can be or what they call early bird check-in, which is checking in ahead of everyone else, and also to upgrade to an A1 through 15 boarding order if they're available. So that can now cost up to $199. Yeah, just crazy. I would never spend that. The early bird can be up to $99, and that's per segment. Well, early bird is per departure and returning. A1 through 15 would literally be per segment. So if you had a connecting flight, you'd need. 

Point being, if you get four of those on that premium card, and they could potentially be worth $199, you can see you very easily make up that annual fee. So I like the higher perk. 

There's a middle one there. I don't ever recommend that one because, to me, it's a $99 annual fee. It's not worth paying that higher annual fee because you really get no perks. You should just go for the cheap one if you don't want the perks or the full perks one. 

Then they have the two business cards. Again, the lower one, that one just comes into play depending on how many points you need for companion pass. But otherwise, it's not worth getting itself for it doesn't have great perks. Again, I like the higher perks. That's the performance business. But, yeah, I think the only changes we'll see will be the early check-ins and the upgraded boardings will just turn into seat selections of some variety. 

Devon: If there was a perk or a benefit that you think one of these Southwest credit cards could offer that's really in line with some of these changes, what do you think that might look like? 

Lyn: Well, I think if you could give them better opportunities to earn status through these cards, there are opportunities to earn points towards Southwest status. But it's really still ridiculous, in my opinion. You essentially have to spend $150,000 or something on the cards. They even have a promotion right now. So now you only have to spend $120,000 to get the status, right? 

So that's never a thing I recommend doing because you would do so much better to put your spending on another card instead than trying to get status on that. So if they could improve that ability to help you earn status more quickly or maybe you earn status by meeting a minimum spend or something like that, I think that would be appealing. 

But other than that, I mean, I can't really think of any other features that they offer that you don't have access to that you could that they could put on those cards. Lounge access, but they don't have lounges, so. Yes, that's what they need to put on the list. Add Southwest lounges. 

Devon: Yeah, maybe that's a space.

Lyn: Put access on the cards. 

Devon: Yeah, maybe they'll move into that space. You know, certainly over the last year, two years, we've seen a lot of credit card issuers moving into that space of having some specific lounges. Especially as an airline, we don't see those yet with Southwest. So that could be an interesting place for them to move into. 

Now, with all of these changes that were announced, it sounds like there are a lot of things to be excited about and looking forward to with Southwest Airlines. But there are still a lot of unknowns about what exactly are some of these changes going to look like, what are going to be some of the rules and regulations around them haven't yet been announced or described. 

For people who are getting more interested in Southwest or who have always been interested in Southwest and are really excited about these changes, what do you think is the best way to just stay updated about what are some of these changes actually going to look like when they do roll out? 

Lyn: Well, I would say to listen to the Families Fly Free podcast and/or get on my email list because I have been following Southwest for a long time, and I know them very well. So as soon as we come up, we have more information about this, I will craft a strategy of what's the best way to do it. 

My strategies are all designed to be very simple. I shared my goals at the beginning there of as many people as possible to as many places as possible, and do it as simple as possible. That's really my strategy to the whole thing. So that's what you would hear from me is what's the simplest way to go at this to still accomplish all of those goals.

You can, of course, go to the Southwest website. They have a new site, which is SWAMedia.com that you can try to follow what's going on there. If there's an investment website, that sometimes has good information. If you're an investor, even if you're not, you could look at that. But I try to stay on top of all their calls and meetings and all of that. Listen to it myself and then share with my followers my analysis based on watching them over the years. 

Devon: All right. Fantastic. We'll put links to your podcast in the show notes and the episode description as well. Before we wrap up today, Lyn, are there any last tips, tricks advice, words that you want to offer people when thinking about Southwest Airlines or these changes in particular for next year that we haven't touched on yet?

Lyn: I would just encourage people to consider Southwest if you haven't. Really don't let the, even if it's a year or more of no assigned seats, stop you from flying them or because they don't have a nonstop from your city. It really comes down to you can fly so many more places on them. 

If there was a trip that you wouldn't take because you didn't want to spend the money on it or you didn't want to spend the points on it, would you take it? If you were able to take it on Southwest for free, would that be worth it to you to take a connection or to not know exactly where you're going to be sitting? Knowing that, again, you can there are some strategies you can take to at least know you'll get an earlier boarding order. 

But it really, really is amazing what you can do with them. My family is a testament of flying at least six times a year since 2015 four people for free on points. That's just nuts to me. I'm still amazed. We're still doing it and showing people how to do it. They don't seem to be changing anything major to keep that from happening. So. Just the fact that they are really a great airline to deal with as kind of icing on the cake of the whole thing. So, yeah, just open your mind and consider them if you haven't flown before.

Devon: Those are great words of advice. Thank you so much for joining me again on the podcast today, Lyn. Thank you for updating us all about these changes that are coming down the pike for Southwest Airlines. I appreciate your time and your expertise. So thank you so much for joining us.

Lyn: Sure. Thanks so much for inviting me to share it all with you. 

Thank you for joining me for this week's episode of Point Me to First Class. If you want more tips on turning your expenses into travel, visit pointmetofirstclass.com to learn more. See you next week.