Baring getting the Southwest Companion Pass, which you should read here, chances are you are not using the right credit card when it comes to getting Southwest Points.
Did I grab your attention? Good you are losing out on a ton of points. Don't believe me?
Chase is the transfer partner for Southwest. So using a Chase Freedom Unlimited or a Chase Freedom combined with a Chase Sapphire Reserve or Chase Sapphire Preferred will net you more points to transfer to Southwest than using any of Southwest cards.
Southwest Premier and Plus Card earns only 1x the points on all other spend. The Chase Freedom Unlimited earns 1.5x. So you can earn 50% more points everywhere else. Lets say you spend $2000 dollars a month everywhere else. You can get 2000 points using your Southwest card or 3000 points on Chase Freedom Unlimited.
Well what about flights? The Southwest Premier Card earns 2x the points on Southwest flights. That is the same as the Chase Sapphire Preferred, but the Chase Sapphire Reserve earns 3x the points. So lets say you spend 500 dollars to fly yourself and your spouse to Florida from California and back again. Put that on your Southwest card and you will earn 1000 points, but put that on the Chase Sapphire Reserve, and you earn 1500 points plus all amazing travel protection the card offers listed here.
Usually you get a co-branded airline card, that is the industry term for a card is sponsored by a retail partner and a bank, for the benefits such as free baggage or priority boarding. But Southwest is AWESOME and doesn't charge for bags, so with the credit cards they give anniversary bonuses, 3000 and 6000 or about $60 to $120 in travel credit, which is not bad and helps negate the annual fee on the Premier card.
So just to recap. Use a Chase Freedom Unlimited card and a Chase Sapphire Reserve card to earn on average 50% more points on non category spend and 100% more points on ticket prices.
