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Reaching A-List mid-trip

eacurtis
Explorer C

I have a round trip starting on Wednesday and returning on Friday for two flight segments.  They will be flights 25 and 26. I've noticed the flights don't credit until after that last flight if the round trip.  That means I won't be A-List for the return trip (flight 26).  Is this correct?  If yes, is therea way to force the first flight to credit early so I'mA-List for the trip home?

5 REPLIES 5

Re: Reaching A-List mid-trip

bec102896
Aviator A
Solution

@eacurtis 

 

First off welcome to the A List (almost).

 

Unfortunately I am not aware of a way to get a flight to post early so you can have the A List for the return flight. The first year I reached A List I was in this same boat and I called trying to see if they could split up my reservation in to 2 one ways and the rep told me she was not able to (you could call and try in case they can now). In my case I just bought the EB for that return flight. 

 

This experience taught me to book one way flights should I lose A List one year and re earn again so when I hit 25 I get every flight after that as A List again.

 

My other idea would be to cancel and rebook as one ways but since your flight is so soon the price has probably increased a good bit and wouldn't be worth the extra money just for the few A List perks. 

 

Hope this helps!

Blake 

Re: Reaching A-List mid-trip

Jwalsh3rd
Adventurer A

The system can be tweeked a little by the user by making your reservations One-Way (there is a button when you start the reservation process on-line).  That allows you to have two separate   two tickets issued for each direction for roundtrip travel. That way, once the first flight is completed and you have reached the appropriate segments or earned the points needed to qualify your status will be updated (though I do not know how long it takes the system to update your status, the points are applied fairly quickly now) without completing the return trip.   I have found  that reserving one-way is easy to do, the price stays the same and I can book one way with RR points and the other way in dollars.  Also, I often book my return much earlier than my outbound flight, because those afternoon flights on Thursday and Friday sometimes book up and sell out before my outbound early morning flights.  That allows me to delay my scheduling for meetings on arrival and book and pay for the outbound at a later time.  Another benefit improves the process of my habit of changing my flights at the last minute for both outbound and inbound flights when IO do need to change only one flight.   This a a perfect way for me to simplify that part of my travel.  Hope this helps.

Re: Reaching A-List mid-trip

chgoflyer
Aviator A

If you call they should be able to split your reservation into 2 one-ways.

Re: Reaching A-List mid-trip

RSH_Houston
Adventurer C

@chgoflyer wrote:

If you call they should be able to split your reservation into 2 one-ways.


Your flights have come and gone, and I hope you had an enjoyable trip! Welcome to A-List status! 

 

But for others with the same question... it is highly unlikely that a Reservationist will be able to split a round trip ticket into two one-ways.  When booked, your round trip was assigned a single reservation number. Every "booking" (ticket) requires it's own unique number. As said by another poster, an outbound or inbound portion of a round trip is very cancellable, the remaining portion continues under the same booking number. To split a reservation into two one-ways requires the system to create a new booking number (requiring a new reservation) for the second flight. As also said in tht other reply, the fare is going to be the lowest fare available at the time this occurs, but see below in RED.

 

I say highly unlikely because, although there are certain things, that by default, the reservation system can not do (and I speak from many, many years of being a very frequent SWA flyer, and it depends upon your approach, and the CS person), there can be work-arounds to some of these defaults. I have found over the years, and I'm sure my loyalty to the airlines plays into this, that policies ARE NOT carved in stone, and many things left to the descretion of the agent. Your length of loyalty is easily discernible to CS by your Rapid Rewards number, mine is mid six digits.

 

Regardless, one might also assume that your A-List status, as regards booking, is your status at the time of booking, not at flight time, as the initial booking is queued into A-List or A-List Preferred for boarding number assignment.

 

Loose you lower fare? Not necessarily - Understand that when you view available fares, "sold-out" and "un-available"  are two completely different things. Sold-out is that, sold-out (although I can only assume cancellations could change this status, as SWA doesn't want to loose these fairs), while un-available means currently unavailable. Many times un-available Wanna Get Away fares come back as flight times near, a method of "filling the plane", so when you want to make a change, or perhaps reduce your fare cost, always check, right up to the same day as your flight.

 

Hope this helps someone!

 

 

 

   

Re: Reaching A-List mid-trip

chgoflyer
Aviator A

Perhaps it's dependant upon the phone rep, but I've had round trips split into separate itineraries more than once. It never seemed to be that big of a deal.

 

With regards to A-List status, previously it did only apply to new bookings, made after status was obtained. You needed to call to have the status added to your existing reservations. I've been told that is no longer the case, that the system apparently does some sort of sweep periodically to update status, but I have no experience to verify that. I'd still recommend calling once you obtain A-List if you have outstanding bookings.