The popular 50,000 point promotion for the Southwest Airlines Rapid Rewards Premier card is here once again. When you spend at least $2,000 within the first 3 months of opening your account, you’ll earn 50,000 bonus points. 50,000 points doesn’t go quite as far as it used to, given the recent Southwest point devaluation, but it still can be worth over $700 towards Wanna Get Away fares.

Other features of the card include:

• 2 points per $1 spent on Southwest Airlines purchases made directly with the airline
• 2 points per $1 spent on Rapid Rewards® Hotel Partner,
  Car Rental Partner, and point purchases
• 1 point per $1 spent on all other purchases
• No foreign transaction fees
• 6,000 points after your Cardmember Anniversary
• 1,500 Tier Qualifying Points for every $10,000 in purchases — earn up to 15,000 TQP each calendar year

The card does carry a $99 annual fee, which will be applied to your first billing statement.

One of the distinguishing points of the Premier card is the ability to earn elite status faster. As noted above, you’ll earn 1,500 Tier Qualifying Points (TQPs) for every $10,000 in purchases, up to a limit of 15,000 Tier Qualifying Points earned each calendar year through your credit card spending. 35,000 TQPs earns you A-List status, with benefits like priority boarding and a 25% point earning bonus on each flight. At 70,000 TQPs, you earn A-List Preferred status, which confers perks such as priority boarding and a 100% point earning bonus. 110,000 TQPs earns you a companion pass, which allows you designate one person of your choice to fly with you for free, anytime for an entire year.

When you have Companion Pass status, you can name one designated companion who can fly free with you every time you fly on Southwest, provided they share the exact itinerary as you, as long as a purchaseable fare for your itinerary is still available. If you have someone else that you travel with frequently, the Companion Pass is a great deal, as you can effectively halve your airfare.

April 2015 Southwest point devaluation
As of April 17, 2015, Southwest once again changed its Rapid Rewards award structure. In their original announcement, they said:

the number of Rapid Rewards Points needed to redeem for certain flights will vary based on destination, time, day of travel, demand, fare class, and other factors. However, there are still many flights which will stay at the current redemption rate. And don’t forget that when fares go on sale, so do the points needed for redeeming for a reward flight on those fares.

Based on numerous data points, what this has meant in practice is that the number of points now required to redeem for a Wanna Get Away fare is dynamic, ranging from 70 points per $1 to 80 points per $1, and is based on the Base Fare of the itinerary. (The Base Fare is the original price of the ticket, before fees, taxes and other surcharges are included.) That’s up from the previous 70 points per $1 that was required.

Since Southwest hasn’t explicitly stated what the new redemption values are, however, they are leaving themselves some wiggle room to change the redemption levels without any additional official announcement. For the time being, however, 50,000 points can still potentially be redeemed for over $700 in Wanna Get Away fares, if you are able to find the right itinerary.

For more info or to apply for this offer, see the following link:

Application