The most upsetting churning news of the past week was a new rule implemented by Chase on the Southwest personal credit cards. Going forward, you will not be approved for a second Southwest personal card if you are a current cardholder of a different personal card or received the bonus on a personal card in the past 24 months. This is very similar to the Chase Sapphire rule implemented last summer.
This will make it more difficult to get the Companion Pass, but it is still possible to receive the bonus on the business card and a personal card.
It’s totally reasonable that Chase would want to cut down on rewards abuse of the Southwest cards. In the past, it was almost too easy to get the Companion Pass. Doctor of Credit reported rumors of a new premium Southwest personal card with an even higher sign-up bonus as the impetus for the restriction.
Let’s hope that this rule doesn’t affect the business card in the future because then we may be SOL for an easy Companion Pass.
Final Thoughts
I’d been holding off on personal cards as part of our Companion Pass 4-Year Plan. My fiancé earned the Companion Pass through 2019 by opening the business card and the Plus card. The plan was for me to get back under 5/24 by the end of 2019 so I could get the Companion Pass for 2020 and 2021. Of course, we don’t know if the Companion Pass will be an option this far out. Changes like this make me nervous about being able to get it solely through sign-up bonuses. My fiancé was also planning on opening the Premier card sometime this year so we would have even more points to use with our Companion Pass. Guess we will have to choose a different Chase card for that 5/24 slot. Talk about first world problems!
