Southwest Testing New Features, Plans to Launch More Targeted Promos

Southwest launched a promotion over the last few days with a 20% discount for select Rapid Rewards members. It was apparently offered to select Southwest Chase Cardmembers. But the promotion, is also part of a new push from Southwest to start launching more similar promotions in the future.

The 20% award discount was sent out using a new ‘My Account Promo Code’ capability, a Southwest employee revealed on reddit. That capability was quietly added to Southwest accounts back in December, before the holiday mess. This was the first use of it. Eligible cardmembers who received this benefit are planned to receive an email about this starting tomorrow.

“We’re giving it a bit of time to burn in without broad communications in as it’s an entirely new capability,” he said. “This new capability will allow us to offer you promo codes at the account level. Similar to how we now store your unused flight credits in your account.” So more of these promotions are expected.

Also, this year Southwest will roll out a new fully mobile friendly My Account. They will be adding new mobile friendly features, and moving over to this new platform in groups of features, throughout the year. “Potentially as early as March, you should start to see some of the quick links to your Rewards information be updated to be fully mobile friendly when in your app or on our mobile website.”

Another upcoming new feature is “Split Reservation”. This will allow Customers to split off certain passengers from a booked trip while making a change. So if one person isn’t flying anymore, you can split them off and handle their trip separately. The feature is expected to launch in March for Changes and will possibly be added to the Cancel flow later this summer.

Finally, Southwest is also testing “Nearby Airport shopping later this Spring”. This should be a nice addition.