Today I'm giving away a free oneway award on Southwest Airlines that must be flown by April 20, 2013. Specifically, I am giving away half of a standard award--a capacity-controlled award on Southwest Airlines. Standard awards are a relic of the old Rapid Rewards program.

Eight months ago, I converted 19,200 Rapid Rewards points to a Southwest standard award. I explained how to do that in How to Exploit the Southwest-Airtran Merger.

I did this because Southwest currently effectively operates two loyalty programs, a revenue based program and a chart-based program.

Today only, there are some great deals on the non-legacy carriers.

Southwest

Southwest is offering oneway flights on Christmas Eve for $100 or less oneway. This could considerably cut down on your holiday fares, if you can combine the fare with a cheap oneway home. The full list of cities and T&C are here.

Here's LAX's list of sub-$100 destinations.

Atlanta, Nashville, and Chicago stand out as steals. Here's Chicago's (MDW) list:

The discounted fares can also be purchased with fewer points.

Today only, Southwest is offering 40% off roundtrip flights flown between 12/11/12 and 2/12/13 on Tuesdays and Wednesdays.

That's a massive savings if you can take advantage. Unfortunately I literally need a flight for February 13, the day after the promo period. Alanis Morisette would probably call that "ironic" since she doesn't know what that word means.

The deals are pretty incredible.

Here's a transcon for $221.

Joanne writes:

"I have accumulated approximately 55,000 Southwest Rapid Rewards. I see that I have a Southwest flight credit that is expiring, and Southwest wants me to use 18,000 points to create a reward flight. I have my eye on a roundtrip award to Phoenix that costs 29,000 points. Is it worth it to do this? I am so confused. Any help is appreciated."

I can sympathize with Joanne's confusion.

American Airlines Escalating Bonus on Miles Purchases

According to this post on MilePoint, through November 15th American Airlines is offering up to 12,000 bonus miles when you purchase AAdvantage miles. The maximum number of miles you can purchase in a calendar year (and also through this promotion) is 40,000.

To purchase, follow this link and input your AAdvantage information.

As you can see from the terms and conditions page below, the highest bonus is earned when you purchase between 36,000-40,000 miles.

There are some great deals and tips kicking around the web that were already written up perfectly. I have added a few notes, and hopefully the aggregation will be useful.

1) Mile Nerd flags the opportunity to earn 15 American Airlines miles per dollar on donations during October--Breast Cancer Awareness Month--to Susan G. Komen for the Cure.

Donate through the link on this page. Full terms and conditions:

If you were already intending to donate, this is a great deal.

Pre-posting update: Wyndham is trying to renege on the deal. A rep posted on FlyerTalk:
Sorry for the confusion everyone. To clarify there were 2 parts to this promotion.
First part were for members who were targeted through email and the dates for that part were August 6, 2012 to October 6, 2012 and completed by October 9, 2012.
Second part is for member's who were targeted through direct mail. Dates for this part are 9/12/12 to 12/31/12 and completed by 1/3/13.
To qualify you need to have been sent the direct mailer and book through the link provided.

Update 10/13/14: Southwest awards now cost 70 points per dollar of the cash fare instead of 60. Taxes are now $5.60 per direction within the United States instead of $2.50 per flight. Everything else is the same.

The other day I helped a friend book a roundtrip Southwest award from Los Angeles to Denver for 11,761 Rapid Rewards and $5, taking advantage of a 1,000 Ultimate Rewards transfer to make up a shortfall of points in her account. For some people, this post will be very basic.

Southwest Holding Huge Winter Fare Sale

The Southwest forum on FlyerTalk is buzzing about Southwest's recently announced "Big Winter Sale." Fares to most cities are a whopping 40% off which creates some incredible values in the Southwest route network. To take advantage of the sale, you must book by midnight on Thursday, October 11 and fly 11/28 - 12/12 or 1/7 - 2/14 excluding Sundays.

To book, simply go to the main Southwest home page and enter your city pairs.

1. Frugal Travel Guy posted an awesome rundown of the major credit-card issuers' rules on how far apart applications must be and how churnable their bonuses are. I have it bookmarked for my future use.