If you’re a frequent visitor to the site, it’s no secret that I love travelling. Mrs. Money and I share this passion and have been fortunate enough to take several trips together. As it’s something we love, it’s where we decide to spend our money. I was also fortunate enough to have a job that I semi-frequently travelled for and was able to build up a nice stash of airline miles and points. If you’re curious to learn more, here are a few other articles I’ve written on the topic: How I earn $900 per year with a rewards credit card or How I booked first class to Europe (free). I’ve recently gotten a new credit card and wanted to share a little bit of the behind the scenes thinking/logic that went into it. 

Disclaimer – Credit Cards can be a very powerful tool to reward you with cash back or travel but can also be a slippery slope when you don’t pay off the balance each month and incur interest charges. YMF does not condone spending more than you make each month and encourages responsible use of credit cards. Consider the implications on your credit score and your own financial strategy before opening a new card. 

The offer

I’ll go ahead and start by explaining the offer. I currently have 4 rewards credit cards in my wallet and am paying annual fees on all of them. Each card meets a different goal and has different benefits all that which play into my credit card strategy. I’m always on the hunt for new deals, and this past week, a new one came out: Southwest offering a companion pass for a whole year when you sign up for a credit card. 

I’ve long known about Southwest’s companion pass and found it intriguing. If you hit their highest membership tier by flying/spending a lot, they’ll reward you with a companion pass. That means that every time you fly Southwest on any of their flights (with no blackout dates!), you can bring your companion along for free, they just pay a couple bucks in taxes. How cool is that? This deal typically is good for the remainder of the year that you earn it and for the whole year following. Pretty amazing if you like to travel and have a companion that you like to travel with! Southwest has been expanding to more and more cities inside the US and has a handful in Latin America/the Caribbean. Unfortunately you can’t bring anybody as your companion, you have to designate that companion but can change it 4x/year. 

Normally the Companion Pass is out of reach, as you have to fly 50 roundtrip flights with them or earn 110,000 miles in a year. However, their current offer allows you to earn a companion pass after signing up for a Southwest credit card and meeting the spending requirement ($4,000 in 3 months). So, it won’t be for everyone but is certainly a tantalizing offer! For the rest of 2019 after earning the pass, I’ll be able to travel with my companion (Mrs. Money Finance) on Southwest and just pay for one of us. BOGO tickets all year long! 

Why my strategy is changing 

I’ve had a love/hate relationship with Delta for many years. Depending on my travelling frequency (a little in my first job, a fair amount in my second and a little in my current job), I was either all in, or lukewarm towards Delta. Being out of Atlanta, which is a Delta hub, it’s so easy to travel with them and generally their prices, routes and service is better than the other domestic carriers. Flying a fair amount for work earned me Skymiles and elite status (Platinum in 2017, Gold in 2018, Silver in 2019), which further made my travelling experience nice. Although not super common, I’d get upgrades to first here and there and would get Economy Comfort fairly regularly. 

In my new job, I won’t be travelling as much for work, which coincides (although ironically I wrote this article while flying for a work trip) with some life changes coming up. Mrs. Money Finance and I are expecting our first child, Baby Money Finance in late February. Having a new baby at home and travelling less seemed pretty ideal. I won’t be saying a complete goodbye to work trips but am excited to be home more. 

With that, I am re-evaluating my Delta 100% loyalty. Without the elite status, the perks just aren’t there for Delta and it can make sense to shop around for better prices when we travel. Having made that tough decision (truly a first world problem, I recognize), the Southwest offer seemed very intriguing. Southwest has a ton of flights out of Atlanta and often have prices comparable or cheaper to Delta, including crazy sales from time to time. I’ve flown them once or twice but I do know people that swear by them; they make flying fun. 

How I made the decision

Given the fact that I’m not travelling as much for work, it seemed like a good time to change airline loyalties. The Southwest Credit Card offer is incredible and I decided that I didn’t have much to loose by giving it a shot. My credit score is still very high (right below 800) and I’m not planning on taking out any loans any time soon (i.e. just bought a house and pay cash for cars). It seemed like a win-win! I also had a few big purchases coming up; Mrs. Money’s grad school bill was due, so hitting the $4K spending requirement wouldn’t be that hard for me and I expect to hit it in 2-3 months. We have a few trips planned (assuming Baby Money Finance travels well) this year and they were all destinations that Southwest flies to. All of that taken into consideration, I decided to go for it! 

How I plan to maximize it 

Now that I have the credit card, I’m working to hit the spending requirement ($4K) as quickly as I reasonably can. I have a few monthly payments that hit my credit cards automatically so I switched the card that’ll get charged to my new Southwest card. I’ll switch back on the spending requirement occurs. Once I get the companion pass, I’ll start monitoring flight prices, in both in points and dollars. I’ve made a list of possible destination/trips for us to take this year (currently at 8) and will monitor and pull the trigger when the time is right! Thanks to some paternity leave and PTO, I hope to be able to take some quality trips with my family this year. 

Get it for yourself!

This is truly an incredible offer, and you can get the companion pass offer through February 11^th, 2019. I went with the lower annual fee card ($69) but some other cards could definitely make sense for you as well. If you are interested in supplementing your Southwest points, perhaps consider the Marriott card, which will give you the chance to transfer points to Southwest. (I will get some referral points if you choose this offer). Actually, side note, that’s an incredible offer right now, and you’ll get 3 free nights in a Marriott when you signup. Credit cards are a big game and if you get a little creative and play the game, sometimes it can really pan out with lots of free travel! 

UPDATE: This companion offer has expired but you can still get 40,000 miles if you sign up through this offer. Check it out using my referral link.

Happy trails,

YoungMoneyFinance