Southwest Airline Budget fares

Penmac

Mouseketeer
Joined
Mar 31, 2017
Hello budget-minded friends! We usually drive to Disney but are going to attempt to fly this summer with our large brood (7, maybe 8 people total if Nana comes with).

I have a question about SW wanna get away fare. We are traveling next summer to Orlando, and I read on the SW website that the summer calendar opens up sometime this fall. One way fares are advertised as starting within our budget.

Here is my issue... It is possible our dates may shift slightly (literally just a matter of days within the same week- vacation work schedule headaches that can't be avoided). We won't know this for another couple months, and will have to make a decision on booking a flight first since I want to book the low fare as soon as the calendar opens up.

My question is-- if we need to change our dates slightly does Southwest charge you the difference on the price of the flight? For example, if we book an $89 wanna get away fare for a Monday and then a month later find out we need to change to Wednesday but the only available fares left are $200, will we be charged the difference? Or, does the fact that we already secured the low rate fare protect us from additional charges? I am confused about how this wanna get away fare actually works!!

Thanks in advance for advice. I am leaning towards just waiting until I know the exact departure date of our trip to book airline travel, but I am nervous I will miss out on a fare my large family can actually afford. :)
 
Southwest will not allow you to book at a lower price and then switch to a more expensive flight without paying the price difference. If they did, everyone would book the lowest price flight they could find and then immediately switch to a more expensive flight.
 
Good point! I wasn't thinking about those logistics at all. We don't fly very often so these things that should immediately occur to me, do not! Thanks for the advice.
 
You should know that on opening day, the lowest fares may appear to sell out quickly, but it's a trick. Southwest purposely only releases a VERY small number of Wanna Get Away fares on opening day in order to push people to the higher fares. Then later, when they realize that the flights aren't anywhere close to full, they will randomly release the lowest fares again or have a "sale." Honestly, don't book until you have concrete dates and not any sooner than like 6-8 weeks out. SW best fares will be available closer to the flight date.
 


SW is one of the few airlines that doesn't charge you a change fee. So if you paid 89 and the new price is 109 - you only pay the 20 difference. With other airlines you would also pay a "change fee" or a penalty fee for the right to move your flight.

BUT if you pay 200 and then change to a new flight that is 150 - they don't put the 50 back on your credit card. They do give you the 50 back as a voucher that can spent within 12 months though.
 
THANKS!!!! Great info. We did fly Southwest several years ago before we had our last 2 kids, and I remember getting a good fare 8 weeks before travel. I thought it was a lucky fluke or that our travel dates were off-peak, but what you are describing makes perfect sense. I am keeping my fingers crossed that we can avoid a 20 hour drive one way at least this once! :) Disney is worth it, but skipping that drive at least once would be awesome!
 
BUT if you pay 200 and then change to a new flight that is 150 - they don't put the 50 back on your credit card. They do give you the 50 back as a voucher that can spent within 12 months though.

Just a heads up about this, it is 12 months from when the airfare was PURCHASED not when the flight is going to be, so if you purchase the flight in October, the flight is in May, but you get the credit in February, you only have until October to fly with the credit.
 


Not trying to hijack, but I have a question about booking flights. Currently I have 6 of our 8 tickets booked. For our flight out I booked myself and DS together then later booked DH and DD together. I'm not too worried about us sitting together. DD will probably actually do better if she's not next to me or DS because she'll want to sit on my lap the whole time or DS will torment her the whole time. For the return I've booked myself and DS, but I was waiting on booking DH and DD because I almost had enough points to pay for 1 ticket. I'm currently about 600 points away, but if prices go down I should be good. I knew with points it was all or nothing for purchasing a ticket, but I was thinking I'd be able to use points for one and a gift card on the other, but it doesn't look like it's that way. Does anyone know if I'd be able to purchase my tickets for DH and DD separately? DD is 2 so I wasn't sure how this would work.
 
Not trying to hijack, but I have a question about booking flights. Currently I have 6 of our 8 tickets booked. For our flight out I booked myself and DS together then later booked DH and DD together. I'm not too worried about us sitting together. DD will probably actually do better if she's not next to me or DS because she'll want to sit on my lap the whole time or DS will torment her the whole time. For the return I've booked myself and DS, but I was waiting on booking DH and DD because I almost had enough points to pay for 1 ticket. I'm currently about 600 points away, but if prices go down I should be good. I knew with points it was all or nothing for purchasing a ticket, but I was thinking I'd be able to use points for one and a gift card on the other, but it doesn't look like it's that way. Does anyone know if I'd be able to purchase my tickets for DH and DD separately? DD is 2 so I wasn't sure how this would work.

I don't know the answer to that - but I had a question about booking tickets for an 18 year old and a 16 year old that weren't related to each other and I wanted to be sure - so I called the SW customer service number. I got through to a person really fast and she was great and answered all my questions - so maybe a quick phone call would give you an answer.
 
@Penmac be sure to sign up for Southwest emails. You get alerted when they have their sales. Occasionally they'll have an amazing 3 day sale so it's nice to get a notice about those. But I agree with PP to go ahead and wait on your dates. As long as you have those at least 6-8ish weeks before your flight then you shouldn't have a problem finding a good fare.
 
Just a tip to help budget for Southwest. If you have a Target RedCard, you can buy Southwest gift cards at a 5% discount at Target. I bought 3 $100 SW gift cards this morning and used them to buy my ticket for January. The gift cards do not apply to the Early Bird Check-in, though. Gotta use a credit card for that.
 
The thing I would add is because there are 7-8 of you, when you check flights and prices, DONT put all 7-8 people in. Check it for only one person and see what the fares are. Lets say you put one person in and the 1 way fare is $89. If you change that to putting 8 people in, the fare may jump to $139. The reason is, if there are only 6 seats available at the $89 rate and you need 8, it will automatically charge you the higher rate for all 8 people. Instead, after you find the fare based on a one person search, gradually up the number of people until you see the price change. If its 6, make a reservation for the 6 people at the lower rate, and a reservation for the remaining 2 at the higher price. This may not even be an issue for you depending on when you book but just an FYI. We are a family of 7 and I found that out a long time ago. Its a game and you just have to play it :)
 
Just a tip to help budget for Southwest. If you have a Target RedCard, you can buy Southwest gift cards at a 5% discount at Target. I bought 3 $100 SW gift cards this morning and used them to buy my ticket for January. The gift cards do not apply to the Early Bird Check-in, though. Gotta use a credit card for that.

That's pretty awesome they had the $100, I haven't seen it that high in my stores. Although, I haven't checked online in a while, did they have the higher denomination as eGC's there?
I never bought them at Target because you can only do 3 forms of payment per reservation so it wasn't worth the hassle with the small ones. The website says 3 per ticket but when I called the rep on the phone couldn't make that work (either didn't know you could or how to do it) so she split my ticket into it's own reservation and did us separate.
 
That's pretty awesome they had the $100, I haven't seen it that high in my stores. Although, I haven't checked online in a while, did they have the higher denomination as eGC's there?
I never bought them at Target because you can only do 3 forms of payment per reservation so it wasn't worth the hassle with the small ones. The website says 3 per ticket but when I called the rep on the phone couldn't make that work (either didn't know you could or how to do it) so she split my ticket into it's own reservation and did us separate.

I see $100 and $200 ones online. Anyone know if you go thru a shopping portal, do you get points for southwest cards purchased at target.com? Specifically ultimaterewardsshopping?
 
I used a Southwest Airlines Gift Card recently .. and I discovered using a SWA Gift Card

is treated the same way as credit card purchase .. if you cancel the flight

you have the one year from the initial purchase date to use the funds.
 
Not trying to hijack, but I have a question about booking flights. Currently I have 6 of our 8 tickets booked. For our flight out I booked myself and DS together then later booked DH and DD together. I'm not too worried about us sitting together. DD will probably actually do better if she's not next to me or DS because she'll want to sit on my lap the whole time or DS will torment her the whole time. For the return I've booked myself and DS, but I was waiting on booking DH and DD because I almost had enough points to pay for 1 ticket. I'm currently about 600 points away, but if prices go down I should be good. I knew with points it was all or nothing for purchasing a ticket, but I was thinking I'd be able to use points for one and a gift card on the other, but it doesn't look like it's that way. Does anyone know if I'd be able to purchase my tickets for DH and DD separately? DD is 2 so I wasn't sure how this would work.
You just need to book the tickets separately. It should go through since I can book DS separate. The only flights I can’t and have to call for are international flights. If it won’t let you then just call SW to purchase it. They have always been very efficient. Also, booking tickets together has nothing to do with the seating on SW. They have open seating. If you purchase early bird check-in, SW will automatically check you and assign your boarding group and position like A46. If not, you can check-in 24 hours before your flight and will be assigned a boarding group and position like B14. Group A boards first and picks their seats, then family board for those traveling with kids under 5 then group B and finally group C. Everyone selects their seats from whatever is open as they board.
 
FYI - BJ's (possibly Sam's - I don't go there) has discounted SW cards as well, $100 and $200($97.99 and $194.99). But I believe you can only use 4 forms of payment for SW, unlike Disney where you can use multiple GC. So you could only use 4 GC, or 3 and a cc.
 
Not trying to hijack, but I have a question about booking flights. Currently I have 6 of our 8 tickets booked. For our flight out I booked myself and DS together then later booked DH and DD together. I'm not too worried about us sitting together. DD will probably actually do better if she's not next to me or DS because she'll want to sit on my lap the whole time or DS will torment her the whole time. For the return I've booked myself and DS, but I was waiting on booking DH and DD because I almost had enough points to pay for 1 ticket. I'm currently about 600 points away, but if prices go down I should be good. I knew with points it was all or nothing for purchasing a ticket, but I was thinking I'd be able to use points for one and a gift card on the other, but it doesn't look like it's that way. Does anyone know if I'd be able to purchase my tickets for DH and DD separately? DD is 2 so I wasn't sure how this would work.
I’ve booked my son online separately multiple times (when using points to fly.) You just have to have already booked one of the adults traveling first as when you enter the child’s age and don’t select “unaccompanied minor” it will prompt you to enter the adult’s name and confirmation # who is accompanying the child.
 
I’ve booked my son online separately multiple times (when using points to fly.) You just have to have already booked one of the adults traveling first as when you enter the child’s age and don’t select “unaccompanied minor” it will prompt you to enter the adult’s name and confirmation # who is accompanying the child.
Thank you very much!
 

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