Star Alliance - Best *A airline to join for Shanghai based...

Hi there...as an Aussie living in Shanghai, wondering if the forum group had any recommendations on which *A program (airline) to join. In the past I have lived in Taipei (hence my tag) and flew CX all the time and had sapphire status with OW.

Due to lack of OW coverage in China thinking now about changing to *A, and in particular thinking about UA, SQ, or CA. Does anyone know which one is better? I would like to get to *Gold status in as short as time as possible.

My annual flights (unfortunately all in Y due to company policy) are:
- 30-40 return flights within China
- 1 return Melbourne
- 3 return Chicago
- 2 (Asia/Europe)

If there are any threads that already discuss this, I would really appreciate a link.
Thanks a lot, ^

Firstly, there is a high chance of FM leaving *A in the near future so you have to see whether *A is still the right alliance for you.

If *G status is the most important thing for you than I would recommend to join either TK or OZ. Both programs give you *A status relatively quickly. TK even lets you buy EQM whereas OZ is good for up to 4 years (2 years to qualify and then another 2 years). Just make sure that you have the right booking classes to get any miles with those programs.

I would stay away from SQ at almost all cost. CA might be an option since you will be flying a lot with them and it is always good to be an elite of the airline you actually fly with. UA is an option as well but is worse for *G than TK or OZ but better for flight redemptions.
Last but not least, AC is another easy *G program.

Thanks DownUnderFlyer....just done some checking online now and it seems that OZ is the go. 40k miles for their Diamond = *G.

If I was doing the same on AC then, it would take double that @ 80k miles. You are right though, I would have to check the booking class to make sure I get all miles in OZ.

I did note that someone posted something about UA having minimum 500 miles for each segment, that is why I was looking at that one.

Regarding upgrade OPs, I have basically given up that, and think that if I keep Silver Marco Polo + *G via OZ, it would probably serve me best no matter where I need to go. Serve me best = business counter, business lounge and possibly preferred seating.

Thanks for your advice.

Cheers....

UA has a minimum of 500 miles for their elites for UA flights. So if you have a lot of them then it might be worthwhile. They also give nice upgrade certificates to their elites.

AC only need 35k miles per year which might be easy depending on your flying.