Southwest Airlines gift card: fly for less, or sell it for cash

Southwest gift cards pay on southwest.com and in the app for any passenger; Southwest allows several gift cards on one booking and issues the ticket to the traveller named on it. The seller books the flight you priced — Wanna Get Away, Anytime or Business Select, whichever you asked for — in your exact name with your date of birth and gender, puts your email and phone on the reservation, and pays with the card. Southwest sends the confirmation to the email on the booking, which is yours.

Verifying a Southwest Airlines booking made for you

On southwest.com or in the app choose Manage / Look Up Reservation and enter the confirmation number with your first and last name. It should show your name, the flights and the fare paid. Southwest's open seating means there is no seat to check — the boarding position is assigned at check-in, 24 hours before the flight, from your reservation.

Cancellation, and why the payout waits for the trip

Southwest lets any fare be cancelled up to ten minutes before departure with no fee: a refundable fare goes back to the original payment (the seller's card), a Wanna Get Away fare becomes a flight credit in the booker's hands. Either way the value would leave you and return to the seller — so the payout is held until the day after your departure, and cancelling a booking made for a buyer ends a seller's account.

What a Southwest gift card is worth here

Southwest gift cards list here at roughly 8–15% off — "southwest gift card discount" is one of the most searched phrases about this card, and the answer is a seller who wants cash more than a future flight. Typical bookings: a Wanna Get Away fare for a weekend, two seats on a Business Select morning departure, a one-way home. Fares and rooms reprice by the hour: up to 5% over the total you saw is the seller's to absorb, more comes back to you to approve. The fee mechanics — 2.5% platform fee, how the discount is matched — are on the travel hub.

Booking Southwest Airlines for less

Price the fare on Southwest Airlines's site and post it on the booking form with every passenger exactly as on ID — date of birth and gender included, the airline cannot ticket without them — the route, the dates and the total. A seller with the card accepts within the hour of opening it and books within two; you pay from your FlipGift balance when they accept, look the ticket up under your name, and the seller is paid the day after you fly.

Selling a Southwest gift card

Southwest gift cards never expire and are the most common airline card people hold and never use. Listing one here turns it into cash without transferring the card: you book a buyer's flight on southwest.com with it, in their name, and are paid the day after they fly. A paid request gives you an hour from opening it to accept and two to book; the payout waits until the day after the passenger flies, and cancelling a ticket you booked for a buyer ends an account here. List it →

Other flights here: Delta Air Lines, United Airlines, American Airlines, JetBlue, Alaska Airlines. Book Southwest Airlines for less now →