Cathay Pacific Asia Miles - Moving to HK - stick with BA EC or not ?

Well the good news is that Sean and I are moving to HK in November this year.

The less than good news is that my BA EC (UK based) Gold membership will expire in Feb 2004.

So, given that travel plans are likely to be limited after the move to short hops within region, I don't expect to requalify as Gold, or even make it up from scratch to an elite level in the CX schemes.

BA have told me that they will transfer my membership into Asia Miles only, but still keeping the EC card. I suppose this means that I can redeem local awards and upgrades easily, rather than get BA to issue stuff ex UK.

So should I just stick with BA for posting miles for the duration - or does anyone have other ideas ?

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by GK:
Well the good news is that Sean and I are moving to HK in November this year.

The less than good news is that my BA EC (UK based) Gold membership will expire in Feb 2004.

So, given that travel plans are likely to be limited after the move to short hops within region, I don't expect to requalify as Gold, or even make it up from scratch to an elite level in the CX schemes.

BA have told me that they will transfer my membership into Asia Miles only, but still keeping the EC card. I suppose this means that I can redeem local awards and upgrades easily, rather than get BA to issue stuff ex UK.

So should I just stick with BA for posting miles for the duration - or does anyone have other ideas ?</font>

1. you get your memnership year reset when moved to asia, so that give you a few more months as Gold.
2. but by far the best program ampong OW is still AA.

Thanks. I used to belong to AA when I was Miami based - but all those miles and long since redeemed..

BA will only let you remain in the European EC scheme if you use a mailing address in Europe. If your mailing address is in HK then I believe you have no choice but to move to the AsiaMiles linked scheme. Not sure in the new BA scheme whether you get elite status bonuses if in the AisaMiles scheme - frankly I doubt it, in which case I would go with Pegasus's advice and use AAdvantage IF (and it's a big if) you will be doing yuour regional flying in full-fare Y, J or F. In discount economy you have the problem that you can't get AA miles for CX flights.

I've been through all this (search for previous discussions in the OneWorld forum) at at the moment am still trying to juggle both Marco Polo and AAdvantage, but I need a job change PDQ if I am to keep them both at Elite level.

Thanks. Looks like i'll be a pleb member of AsiaMiles then. I want to redeem miles on routes out of HK - can't do that with UK based BA EC membership.

Oh well, better get that fake Gold EC card embossed asap http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/wink.gif

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by GK:
I want to redeem miles on routes out of HK - can't do that with UK based BA EC membership.</font>

Er, why not? When I was in my transit period I redeemed plenty of flights out of HK using my European-based BA EC. There are award fares in the new scheme for flights in Asia. What makes you think this is not possible? You might also want to compare the new BA award tables and the AsiaMiles ones, remembering that if you stay as a Gold in the BA UK scheme you will probably earn miles significantly faster than in AsiaMiles because AM has no status bonuses.

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by christep:
BA will only let you remain in the European EC scheme if you use a mailing address in Europe. If your mailing address is in HK then I believe you have no choice but to move to the AsiaMiles linked scheme. Not sure in the new BA scheme whether you get elite status bonuses if in the AisaMiles scheme - frankly I doubt it, in which case I would go with Pegasus's advice and use AAdvantage IF (and it's a big if) you will be doing yuour regional flying in full-fare Y, J or F. In discount economy you have the problem that you can't get AA miles for CX flights.

I've been through all this (search for previous discussions in the OneWorld forum) at at the moment am still trying to juggle both Marco Polo and AAdvantage, but I need a job change PDQ if I am to keep them both at Elite level.</font>

no elite bonus for BAEC in asia

yes - so i'll move the account to a family address in the UK. I thought they were supposed to be standardising the scheme - what rubbish.

Anyhow, I am looking forward to travelling on CX in the new role and of course to flat hunting in Hong Kong.

Cheers
Graeme