SW Companion Pass via SW credit card bonuses

I’m thinking about buying Poly DVC and had the idea that I could use new SW credit cards for that purchase to get companion pass. I generally understand how to get CP using the signup bonuses for new SW credit cards, but I have a question or two for those that are familiar with the process:

  1. If I applied for the SW cards today, would I receive them in time to use by end of month (this is ~21 days)?

  2. If I get close to the minimum for sign-up bonus (say $2900 of the $3000), and then went over in December, that would mean the rewards get posted in January, correct? The intention is to get those signup bonuses in January to get CP for entirety of 2025.

Am I thinking about this right?

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You want ALL of the rewards to post in January or later. You’d have to make your DVC purchase in mid-Dec or later.

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Yes, but the way I understand it is the signup bonus doesn’t post until you’ve hit the minimum spend. Right now its $3000 in the first 3 months to get 85,000 pts. So I just need to spend 3000 by end of december and THEN the bonus will post in January. Am I wrong?

Probably. I do credit card bonuses routinely. It takes 2 weeks or so before the cards come in. I have sone the SW card a couple times

You will get your bonus on the next billing cycle after you qualify

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No, you are correct. But you just won’t get credit for those $2900 worth of points as well if you need them.

I am no longer well versed in the strategy here, but DH and I never qualified for the “business” card since we don’t really have an actual business. Perhaps you do, but I felt like there was an overestimation of how easy it was to get two cards.

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TL;DR: Doable, but needs date planning.


You’re in the right ballpark with your thinking, but it is still a little early to start the CP process.

  • If you were approved for both biz and personal cards today you’d have until January 7th to hit the spend - which is possible but is a little tight. (For example: you don’t want to have to spend $1K on Jan 6 and then find it didn’t post until a few days later.)
    Technically you can finish off the spend after your statement closes in December since any points earned after that (the SUB) should hit in January. But, you REALLY want to have your dates locked down or you could end up seeing the SUB points hit this year. (Every year in the points groups there are flurries of people who mess up the timing.) The advice is usually just wait until January for the last spend to avoid any hiccups.

  • You’d want to leave a decent amount more than $100 of the spend outstanding because Chase has been known to award the points if you get close on those cards. Might not be a common occurrence, but there’s always a few people in the groups with that problem each year. You’d probably be safer with more like $500-$1K to spend in January.

*There’s a decent chance you’d get your cards within 2 weeks if approved, but business card approvals can sometimes take a week or longer before they go through if you don’t get immediate approval. (My last Ink took 2 weeks.) If you have to wait for that THEN go to recon if denied you could easily blow past the 21 days from now if you did get approved later.

Here’s last year’s 10xTravel post on the topic - they should be posting a new one soon when they think the best window to start has arrived.

Oh, also: make sure you know your Chase 5/24 status: if you are are at 4/24 and apply for the personal first, then you will not be approved for the biz card.

Usual advice is to apply for the biz card first anyway - since theoretically it can be harder to get approved for biz cards (probably not much harder for these SW cards) - if you did find you are denied for one and can’t get that reversed through recon then you might decide getting the personal card is not worth it.

I know all of that in a row makes it sound a bit complicated - in practice it really isn’t, but trying to shoehorn it into a tight timeline makes all of the relevant factors more important.

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