Southwest Award Flights Count for A-List/A-List Preferred Qualification
Update: Southwest sent out emails today confirming the information provided in this article from September 13th. But there’s also an opportunity with two more ways to earn A-List or A-List Preferred:
- Earn with new reward travel when you book with Rapid Rewards points and fly by 11/30.
- Earn double tier qualifying points on travel you book and fly by 11/30.
Check your emails or try this link to see if you are eligible.
Southwest Airlines’ Rapid Rewards program has the A-List and A-List Preferred Status tiers for loyal customers.
A member who flies 25 qualifying one-way flight segments booked through Southwest or earns 35,000 tier qualifying points per calendar year will qualify for A-List status. A Member who flies 50 qualifying one-way flights booked through Southwest or earns 70,000 tier qualifying points per calendar year will qualify for A-List Preferred status.
When it comes to qualifying flights, the terms state that Rapid Rewards reward flights or any travel with any portion of the purchase price paid for with Rapid Rewards points do not qualify for A-List status.
However, Southwest in recent days is counting these flights and this is already showing in your accounts if you have any award flights since the start of the year. it’s not clear if this is a glitch, or if Southwest is testing out yet another improvement for its customers.
Reports from FlyerTalk show that this one-time event is only valid for award flights from January 1st through September 19th, and it was confirmed by Southwest media relations.
It’s worth noting that this only applies to A-List and A-List Preferred qualifications. These award flights do not count toward Companion Pass qualification.
Conclusion
If you’re going for Southwest elite status, then this should give you a boost and get you closer to the finish line. The way it’s being applied it’s a bit strange.
Check your account and let us know what you see!
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Proof that business travelers are not coming back (as of now). They’ve watered down requirements since they can see/forecast that the demand from business travelers isn’t there, and they might as well throw in some incentives to juice those elite numbers up. Lower the threshold this year to lock in those who would otherwise lose status and, if business demand gets better, will have status locking them in vs finding greener pastures.
Confirmed! … I got a popup saying that when I logged in.
Here is a screenshot https://ibb.co/0G1dnp9
Oh great… and I paid $$ this whole year to make sure I would qualify for next year. Oh well.