We usually don’t charge anything to the room other than what might hit from Guest Services at the hotel. I wasn’t sure if you could use the redemption card at restaurants, or in the parks at festival booths.
Historically, SW has had the most frequent non-stop flights (at the most convenient times) out of Pittsburgh. But admittedly, I haven’t checked other airlines recently to verify that this is still the case.
I asked because it used to be my preferred airline but when they stopped nonstops in my area, I stopped flying them. I have used points to book flights for family but I have not flown them since 2019.:
Fairly sure you can use it at POS
It works the same places as a Disney Visa. There have been reports that you can also get the 10% discount with it, but I have never tested that.
First things first: You should use whatever card works for you - I’m a super maximizer of course, but sometimes it is just better to do the easy thing that gets you a reward you can use. 
Now: just the points earned from spending on cards will never get you anywhere near the points you’d earn through bonuses.
If you don’t want to play the points game too aggressively, - and most people do not - it is often worth looking into what kind of bonus you might get for the cards you already like and use.
For the Disney Visa and the SW cards, if you haven’t earned a bonus on either of those in 24 months*, you could close either of those cards, wait a week or three, then apply for a new card and earn the sign up bonus again. I believe the DVisa is $300 for the premier card right now. The Southwest personal cards have a 100,000 SW Rewards bonus offer right now, which is the largest seen.
*Important :The banks start the 24 month clock on the date you earn the bonus, NOT the date you open the card.
To step that up a little more: you can play the 2-player game with the cards: you can send your spouse, partner, friend, or kid a referral link to open their own card: you get a referral bonus, they get the sign up bonus after making the spend in 3 months.
Doing this with the Disney Visa: If you refer from your card to other person: You get $100 for the referral, they get $300 bonus for the Premier card after spending $1,000 in 3 months. Then, after you’ve received your $100 and moved points onto a rewards card, you can close yours and use their referral to to the same thing in reverse. Final tally with 2-player mode: $700 in bonuses plus anything earned via spend. (Assuming only 1 person had the card at the start. If you both had the card, add another $100 to the pot.)
Before I played the larger points game I did this every 24 months for years with my DW.
(BTW: Disney Premier card has a $49 annual fee, but you earn double points and the bonus is double too. I’d open a Premier then downgrade it to the free card after a year.)
You can do the same with the current SW personal card offer and earn over 100K points each with the current bonus plus 20K from each referral.
This was a good reminder to cancel my Alaska card before the annual fee hits…
thank you 
You can get 10% discounts at table service, for sure. And when you buy merch over a certain amount (I didn’t buy any merch this last trip, so I don’t remember if it is $20 or something else.)
It used to be they’d ask when they seated you if you were a Disney Visa holder, but I haven’t had that in a while. And i usually forget to say anything, but what happens is they bring the check and you hand them the card and when they come back they say, “I ran your bill again when I saw you had Disney Visa and…” then you have a really long receipt
This just happened to me at Olivia’s in August. It also happened at the Grand California character breakfast. There are times where that 10% is more noticeable than others.
This is not an option with tapping your band. You have to have the card out.
This is the take away.
I used to be a bigger card player (never to your level @JJT). But we would churn regularly. But my goal was to make rewards that I could put toward our biannual Disney trips. We rarely ever ever fly, and when/if we do there is no loyalty, and it’s all about price, times of day, etc. We also are not brand loyal to hotels. Whole family visits find us at rental houses, anyway. And Priceline is my go-to for single night, road trip type stays.
Disney Chase Visa is 100% my card of choice, whereas DH strongly prefers his Discover, and that is what is linked to our Amazon.
The new way you can apply your rewards to WDW purchases after the bill comes is easier than when it was all on gift cards. But the gift card were a little more fun…
You are amazing! Thank you! I don’t know where you find the time and energy for all of this!
You need to cancel it and reapply with a SUB bonus.
Preach JJ!
Best advice, play the game. Those SUBs are where the $$s at. Spending is fine. But unless you have a large monthly spending habit the rewards are in the SUBs. I have been playing the game for a little over 2 years now (give or take) Funnily I was worried about how all the new cards and closing card would effect us. My credit score has never been higher 
“My credit score has never been higher ”
This has been my experience too. 
We plan to be working on a new card with a big SUB whenever there is a big spend on the horizon. And we pay everything off every month and keep an eye on annual renewal dates so we’re not piling up fees.
My sister and I are doing a WDW trip in Dec. and so far have flights, rooms (Hyatt or DVC rentals), and a car for 9 days and are out $143 in cash. Our goal for this trip is the lowest out of pocket cost possible for the two of us — I’m not optimizing for the highest possible redemption value.
With all the new rules, and my companion pass expiring 12/31/25, I am seriously rethinking my loyalty to SW, though. I typically rebook a flight 4 or 5 times to get a better price or a better route at the same price, and that’s easy with points but far less so with cash, now that all those refunds are travel credits that expire.
This has to be key if you’re playing the cc game. Really, this should be everyone’s goal all the time. I think of credit cards and an extension of the bank account. They are a holding bin for the charges but it has to come off the top.
If you deal with points, it’s not really an issue for now. I would look into a SW CC. The only cash SW gets from us is the taxes and fees.
Agree— I have a couple of SW cards from earning the companion pass. I put most of the regular spend on CSP if I’m not working on a SUB bonus, and can always transfer those over, but there are so many better uses for CSP points!