Southwest Winter Sale – $49/$99/$129/$149
Southwest Airlines has launched a sale for winter travel. Many fares are a considerable savings over the usual rates and you can get a pretty good deal booking in the next few days. To travel, you must book by October 16 for travel December 3 through February 11.
The way the sale works is that fares are as low as $49 and are based on the route you fly. Travel on Fridays and Sundays is, unfortunately, excluded so you can’t really fly for a quick weekend. There’s also a blackout period over New Years and Christmas periods from December 18 to January 5, 2014.
As an example, flights from Los Angeles to Phoenix are $49 each way on many dates. This is typically $100 each way so an opportunity to save quite a bit.
Date Restrictions
As I said, travel Friday and Sunday is excluded but there are a few more restrictions based on location:
- Travel to Florida or Nevada is valid Sunday through Wednesday only
- Travel from Florida or Nevada is valid Tuesday through Friday only
- Travel between Nevada and Florida is valid on Tuesdays and Wednesdays only
- Blackout Dates Apply: December 18, 2014, through January 5, 2015
- Fares are valid on non-stop flights only
Using Miles and Points
Southwest Rapid Rewards points have a fixed value of 1.43 cents towards airfare. What that means is that when the price of the ticket goes down, the number of points needed to redeem drops too. Another perk of using Southwest Rapid Rewards points is that you can cancel without penalty. You simply receive the points back into your account.
You can also earn Southwest Rapid Rewards points by transferring them from Chase Ultimate Rewards. You can read about How to Transfer Chase Ultimate Rewards Points to Airlines and Hotels.
A final option is to use Barclaycard Arrival miles, if you happen to have already signed up for the card previously. This can be redeemed for any travel expense as a statement credit. The sign-up bonus of 40,000 miles is worth $440 in travel credit that can be used toward Southwest flights, among others. You can read my full review of the Barclaycard Arrival Plus World Elite MasterCard.
