Yesterday I wrote about the premature introduction (and subsequent shutdown) of the Chase Sapphire Reserve card. The Chase Sapphire Reserve card is scheduled to go live this Sunday (August 21st), but for about an hour on Monday, there was a live application link.
(SEE ALSO: Did you get your new Chase Sapphire Reserve card yesterday?)
Although there was no way to apply for the Chase Sapphire Reserve card when I wrote this post, you can now apply for Top Rewards cards.
Chase Sapphire Reserve travel benefit
I’ve already detailed some of the Chase Sapphire Reserve card benefits, but one that I want to talk about is
- Ultimate Rewards can be redeemed for 1.5 cents towards travel through the Ultimate Rewards portal (SEE ALSO: Why it pays to check the Chase Ultimate Rewards mall before transferring points)
Why that makes redeeming Southwest Rapid Rewards obsolete
Southwest Airlines has a Rapid Rewards frequent flier program which operates on a (mostly) fixed value system. Unlike other frequent flier programs which have a zone or distance based award chart, with Southwest, each Rapid Reward point is worth a fixed amount.
Each point used to be worth 1.67 cents, but was devalued to 1.43 cents in April 2015, and even after that devaluation, another stealth devaluation has dropped the value of Rapid Rewards points on many flights.
(SEE ALSO: Guess which Southwest flights now cost more than 70 points / $?)
But now that you can use the Chase Sapphire Reserve card to redeem travel on many airlines (including Southwest) for 1.5 cents per point, there’s really no reason to ever accrue Southwest Rapid Rewards any more.
An example
Let’s look at an example – here’s a flight from Indianapolis to Los Angeles for a random date. I was going to use Columbus as my destination city but it’s apparently a “small regional airport”
You can see that the nonstop flights cost $134. If we show fares in points, we see
So let’s talk of the 2 options
- Using points – 8,029 Rapid Rewards points, plus $5.60 fee (equivalent to 373 points at the 1.5 cents / point valuation) – net cost is 8,402 points
- Using the Chase Sapphire Reserve card – that $134 flight will cost you 8,933 points but you’ll also EARN 669 points for taking the flight – net cost is 8,264 points
You CAN always transfer your Chase Ultimate Rewards 1:1 to Southwest, but unless there is a transfer bonus, you’d be foolish to do so. Instead you should use your Ultimate Rewards to buy your Southwest ticket
- You’ll use fewer points, as shown above
- You’ll also EARN points on your flight (as far as I know)
One downside is that you can’t book your Southwest flight online through the Ultimate Rewards travel portal – you have to call in – see this disclaimer from the Ultimate Rewards portal
But it’s not always this simple
Unfortunately it’s not always that straightforward. As you saw with the example, it’s complicated because while a cash ticket (including those booked through the Ultimate Rewards portal) has all taxes and fees included in the price, an award ticket also is charged taxes and fees ($5.60 in the case of a domestic US ticket).
But because the 72 cent per point valuation only happens on the base fare portion of the ticket cost, you’ll see differing amounts of ACTUAL value. Looking at some of the 1-stop tickets above (from IND-LAX) you will see that they cost more in dollars and less in points, which makes the math a little different.
Still if Southwest keeps devaluing their points each year, this strategy will become more and more prevalent. Still it’s something to watch out for if you’re booking flights on Southwest.
You can compare the Chase Sapphire Reserve with other cards through this link – I do receive a commission if you apply for a card through this link
Had you realized this about booking Southwest flights through the Chase Sapphire Reserve portal?
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Dan Miller travels with his wife and 6 (SIX!) children. He loves to help families travel for free / cheap, especially larger families. If you are looking for help, drop him an email at 
The price when you call in to Ultimate Rewards will likely often cost more (assuming they can even book it for you at all). There are posts about this when using US Bank Flex points to book Southwest.
Also the cancellation/refare policy is much better using points as I wouldn’t want funds as a travel credit since I don’t fly often. It’s much better just getting the points and $5.60 fee refunded to me.
What about cancelling or re-faring your flight? The big benefit to using RR points is that it basically lets your flight become 100% refundable for a fraction of the actual refundable fare, plus infinite re-fares as the price fluctuates.
If you can still do all that stuff by using UR points, then I’d agree with the conclusion. Otherwise, it’s not “foolish” to use RR points, even if a few hundred more, for that added flexibility.
Jet Blue needs to hurry to ATL. Southwest is no longer the low cost carrier. Most fares I need Delta is actually cheaper now out of ATL. Sadly that is not saying much as they are still high, It is just that SW is higher.
Yup – Southwest is certainly not a “discount” airline any more!
Whats also intersting is that the grey market value of ultimate rewarrs is likely to rise, because untill now the highest price i have heard of was 1.45 per point but now there is no reason to sell at such a value.
Seriously no mention of the companion pass in this article? You can’t get a free spouse/friend/son/daughter on every southwest flight you take without earning 110k rapid rewards points a year.
It makes that 1.43 cents per point be worth 2.86 cents.
It’s funny you should mention that – I actually DID have a section on the CP but took it out. While it’s true that the Southwest Companion Pass is a great deal, for purposes of this article. The CP works the same whether it’s a paid flight or an award flight. If anything it makes it MORE of a reason to transfer points from the Chase Sapphire Reserve, since flights paid for through the Ultimate Rewards portal will earn points and count towards earning the CP. Most people I know earn the CP from credit card points, since points transferred from Chase to Southwest do NOT count towards earning the Companion Pass
Right, so these new Ultimate Rewards points will now be worth 3 cents each if someone has the companion pass, right?
But how are most people going to earn the CP if they ditch the southwest cards? Rapid rewards aren’t “obsolete” as your title suggests but instead there’s just no point earning more than 110,000 during each year before ditching RR and earning UR points.
In my case I’m seriously considering this new card because during the last 3 years I’ve earned the CP the “old fashioned” way through paid business flights.
Garrett,
I don’t think you’ll want to look at it that way. The companion pass gets you 2 for 1 tickets. It is a discount.
It doesn’t make your points more valuable, any more than it makes the dollar in your pocket worth $2. You can pay cash for a ticket and still get 2 tickets. A dollar is worth a dollar, a Ultimate Reward point is worth 1.5 cents and the WN point is worth around 1.5 cents.
Scott
Exactly! Rapid reward points are necessary for earning CP which beats any UR redemption!!!
I didn’t think that Southwest supports purchasing tickets from third-party travel sites. Are you sure you can book Southwest flights through the Chase Travel Portal?
Yes – there’s a screenshot from the Chase Ultimate Rewards portal in the post that specifically mentions Southwest, and having to call in
sub
How about CVG? :p
Definitely a better deal if you don’t have the CP and fixed travel dates (ones you know you won’t or can’t cancel).
Hoping and praying they approve me for the card!
Wikipedia says that CVG is the 53rd busiest airport in the US while CMH is 49th so that sounds better 😛
Sometimes, maybe. But overall, definitely no.
Using southwest points will ALWAYS be the best option, due to free cancellation, and free refunds.
Additionally, your own example proves you wrong. You chose the nonstop flight for your comparison. But that happened to be an option where RR points are worth less. Use the first flight listed instead–for example–and you get an RR point value of over 1.7 cents each ($142-5.60, divided by 7,996).
No one would pick a 6AM flight with a plane change for 30 more points just cause it has a higher “value”. You’re ridiculous.
Lol. You’re ridiculous if you can’t understand that I was discussing value, not efficiency. And I’m sure someone, somewhere would prefer to get into Los Angeles 2 hours earlier.
*33 points. Idiot
Though that gap is getting narrower if using the CSR, using RR is still the way to go. Keep in mind the value of points that people keep referring to is on the BASE FARE only. I just completed a trip a few weeks ago that put the total point value at 1.7 cents, and my trip next March is valued at 1.6 cents. Add in the flexible cancellation policy and the ability to refare, using UR instead of RR is no longer a better option.
On our spring break trip last year I saved 8k points per ticket by rebooking; that’s huge for a family of 5, plus my wife is traveling on the CP.
What is interesting to me about the CSR is now just about any travel booking is now more attractive. Getting 1.25 cents/point didn’t interest me, but 1.5 is just enough to consider it.
Right – it’s just like the Prestige on American value (1.6 but going away) but good for ALL travel!
Southwest RR points are not as fixed value as everyone makes them out to be. I’ve gotten value in the neighborhood of 2.4 cents per point by hitting on sale fares recently. As mentioned previously, even your own example proves you wrong, as there are flights in said example that have a higher cash value but lower redemption rate. It pays to do some research on these Southwest legs, and it also pays to keep researching them even after you book, as Southwest will refund points to you if the fares drop and the redemption rate goes down.
This hits the nail on the head. Re-booking at lower fares using RR with no change fees and getting your point balance refreshed with the difference is what makes Southwest RR Points so valuable. I book multiple advance flights all the time knowing I have the flexibility to change them whenever I want. Can’t do that with other airlines booked through the UR portal.
The moral of the story is that you need to do the comparison each time you purchase a flight, not only for Southwest but also for other airlines. I think the author’s point is that you used to be able to assume that Rapid Rewards would always be the better deal, and now you can’t do that. Neither RR or UR will always be better. Do the math each time!
If you think earning RR points on a flight is one of the 2 main perks of buying the flight with UR points, you can’t say the RR points are obsolete! Obviously you are going to want to use the RR points that you accrue by flying.