I am a consultant who will be traveling weekly between Minneapolis and Phoenix for about 1 year. I am attempting to find a program that will link up with a credit card, but the tricky part is that I have to use an American Express card since that is my client. I have an idea for a strategy, which would be to fly Continental and NW and have all of my miles go to Continental, and join member rewards with my card and have those go to Continental. Does anyone have any other ideas or will this be my best option. Thanks!!!!

If you're going to fly this route for only one year, you might want to try and plan for the following years right now before you commit. Is CO the main carrier, who would you be flying in the future, etc. In any case, leaving your AMEX miles in the M.R. account doesn't cost you anything and you can always transfer them when you need them.

Good luck

I concur w/ runningshoes...

If you will be flying this route for only a year, but your travel afterwards might be w/ America West, given that PHX is a hub, etc. (& that you're from Tempe), you may want to consider flying America West--but still take advantage of the HP/CO alliance (particularly re: reciprocity in status recognition [FC upgrades]). If doing so, you could still (1) benefit from key aspects of the HP/CO/NW alliances, (2) fly directly between PHX & MSP (you have few carriers w/ whom you could fly directly between the 2 cities--NW & HP are 2 of them), (3) earn HP/CO/NW miles w/ an AmEx card (& the same card)--though it would have to be the Starwood AmEx card (I don't know what kind of constraints may have to be factored in re: which AmEx card[s] you are allowed to use), (4) if you did go w/ a Starwood AmEx card, & you happened to choose Starwood as the hotel chain w/ which you stayed (assumption = you would be staying @ least one night on your weekly trips), there are rumored to be additional benefits to such re: additional Starpoints for Starwood lodging charges charged to the card (June 15 = the date on which we are to hear the official announcement re: details of the revamped card), (5) again, an additional benefit of the Starwood AmEx card is the 5,000 bonus mile add-on for transfers of 20,000 miles, (6) if you obtained status miles w/ HP, you could make out very well in terms of bonus miles re: the 3,000 online booking bonus (per trip) available through the end of the year (NOTE: I am not certain just how dependent the bonus is on status miles being credited to the HP acct--there's a bit of ambiguity in the fine print of the Terms & Conditions / it would certainly be nice if folks could obtain status miles w/ CO while also obtaining the 3000 mile booking bonus).

As runningshoes said, if you're only going to be flying the route for a year, you really should look ahead when it comes to planning (w/ which carrier to obtain status miles, w/ which carrier[s] to obtain miles via credit card, etc.). Flying CO btwn PHX & MSP involves some icky connections; it would suck having to spend the amt of time involved--& on a weekly basis. I'm thinking you'll want to fly on HP or NW metal...& garner either HP or CO miles...HP & NW will compete in the PHX-MSP market, & given that the prices don't fluctuate quite the way they do in various other markets, you won't necessarily have to straddle flying HP & NW in terms of which is less expensive. Lastly, I don't know how packed HP's flights are between PHX & MSP, but I'm aware that that route is said to be one of NW's most "bump rich" (& I don't know whether, how often, or to what extent departure delays occur due to the administrative aspects of such). On the other hand, if you had greater competition for FC upgrades when flying HP (I don't know if you would), that could perhaps make it more attractive to fly on NW metal when upgrades became a factor. You may want to post an inquiry regarding these specifics on the HP board.

[This message has been edited by ILTE_Miles (edited 06-14-2001).]

I don't have Delta's schedules in front of me, but if they have reasonable connections via SLC and make sense down the road, you might consider them and a SkyMiles Optima. You can get multiple miles for buying DL tickets - I think the multiplier goes up as you ascend their precious metal ladder, but check - and it's in the AmEx family.

Dude, it's a no-brainer. If you do that trip every week for a year, you're going to want the nonstops, not an SLC connection. So you're on either HP or NW. Both are CO partners, and flights on either airline count toward CO status. You'll be CO elite by the twelve-week mark, and the upgrades start coming... and on HP upgrades are pretty easy to get. As for Amex, CO is a Membership Rewards partner. So get yourself a CO OnePass membership, fly either airline you want, make elite fast and sit in F.