Thanks you guys! It is clearer than mud... it's probably about like chai tea so we're almost there!

There was more than one aspect to my question/s and I think all of them were answered.

I'm going to sate some points. Let's see if I have them straight...

1. My hubby can transfer Starwood points to my ff account.

2. ff miles can be gifted to your spouse (or anyone you wish to gift them to).

3. Thus, gifting them is much easier and more cost effective than transferring, esp. in some cases where transferring isn't allowed.

4. Of course when we fly together and earn miles with a paid ticket, we will wind up having two ff accounts.

Hmmm... so when it comes to transferring Starwood points, how do you determine whether to concentrate on filling one ff account or equally distributing to both? (I had imagined us 'storing' the points in the ff account as opposed to the Starwood account.) I guess knowing a specific award goal would be helpful! All things considered I imagine keeping the points stored in the Starwood account as opposed to being stored in the ff account would be wise. That way when we know what we want to do we can divvy them out as needed.

As far as storing points/miles, who do you think is most stable, Starwood or UA or AA? Ha-ha, likely Starwood, eh?

I added what is below after doing some research on the Starwood board. Apparently w/Starwood you cannot transfer points to a ff account under another person's name. This puts a little different spin on things:

Posted by Lurker:

Due to security restraints, the airlines insist that the name on the Starwood Preferred Guest account and the airline frequent flyer account be exactly the same. This is the number one cause of transfer rejection by the airline.

If the person has the same address as you and is not a Starwood employee, you can do an internal transfer between Starwood Preferred Guest accounts. Then the person could transfer to the airlines on their own.

Best regards,

William R. Sanders
Specialist, E-Communications Department
Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide


[This message has been edited by Julie the Newbie (edited 08-17-2003).]