If I didn't make clear, I got this from some point guru who has a blog. It sounded reasonable. I am not smart (in general) or experienced ( on SW) to know this yet. I am getting there... I did Punta Cana and will be doing New Mexico, Charleston, Aruba and 2 x Fort Lauderdale by years end. We are planning Puerto Rico (most likely) or Cuba in Feb.
I have been using points and funds from the Chase Reserve card that get 1.5 cents per point when used for travel. If you call up the travel number for chase they can book Southwest. The prices are exact to the penny of the Southwest website. Once they book you, you can add the companion on the southwest website (you need to make sure they put your RR number in the record). Onetime I booked using Chase and needed to cancel... the price of the ticket became a dollar credit on Southwest.
Kudos to Southwest. As I posted previously, we have been squeezing in a lot of vacation travel this year taking advantage of the companion pass through the MRP exchange. Not posted was this was driven by my wife's decision to finally have knee replacement surgery she has been delaying for 4 years. She has it planned for the first week March 2018. At times, her bad knee required a few last minute cancellations this year so when this happens, we take Travel Fund Vouchers knowing we are moving not challenging the plans. Our next two major trips are December at the Courtyard Marathon Florida Keys during Christmas and The Ritz Carlton San Juan during February break. It is highly unlikely either will be open. If they are, I wouldn't feel right vacationing in an area while there might be widespread devastation all around. Once these weeks are cancelled, we will have close to $1200 of travel funds that will expire May of 2018.
Via email, I asked Southwest if they would extent the Travel Funds for one year but if that isn't reasonable 6 months would be fine. I told them I have hotel confirmations and a letter of approval from the insurance company for the surgery that I offered to send in to support of my request. 48 hours later, I got an email reply stating that I may qualify for a refund if I send in the documentation. I was not asking for a refund so I called believing this was an auto reply. Sure enough, when I spoke with someone, he explained that if they extend the Travel Funds, it could only be for 6 months and it would cost 100 per confirmation (each leg is on a separate confirmation) . Since this is due to a medical issue, they will refund my money to the form of payment it came from (Chase reward dollars from points). I did not need to send in the documentation to support the medical issue.
This took about 50 minutes on the phone with 30 being spend waiting to speak with someone at the executive customer service office (regular customer service told me who to write and call after I write). This is a great example of customer service.
