It’s Time: Get Your Southwest Companion Pass [Still Alive]

The end of the calendar year is the best time to sign up for Southwest credit cards.

As of 7:30am December 8th, the public links for the 100K offers are still active. I am confident that Chase will honor the 100K offer for those who sign up now, even though the offer page says it is valid until December 7th. Doctor of Credit is a hat tip.

The Southwest Companion Pass doesn't require a million dollars of spend, but it is awesome.

You can add a companion for free to all of your Southwest flights if you earn enough points.

Strategies.

You can only have one personal Southwest card at a time, and you can't get the welcome bonus if you've already earned one.

If you are approved, the personal cards will not add to your count, but the business cards will.

If you have opened 5 or more Chase credit cards in the past 24 months, Chase will not approve your application. 3 easy ways to count your 5/24 status are shown. Travel Freely can be used to track all of your cards for free.

There are a couple of strategies for earning the Companion Pass.

One card is strategy one.

Each of the personal cards is currently offering 100K points after $12K spend.

If you sign up now, you will get a Companion Pass that will count towards your first statement closing date in January 2022.

One option is to overpay taxes, but it can be worth it to get the Companion Pass.

Southwest will give 25,000 points towards the Companion Pass if they do the same thing in 2022.

The second strategy is 2 cards.

The current Southwest business card offers are not as good as the personal card offers, but if you get both, you will have more than enough points for the Companion Pass.

With the offers available at the time of this writing, you only need to spend $8K across the two business cards in order to earn the welcome bonuses.

Signing up for two cards will limit your options if you want to earn a Companion Pass.

Conclusion.

The Companion Pass will be valid for nearly two full years if you earn it early on.