3 trips to the East Coast of the US and 2 trips to Europe is roughly 100,000 miles/yr. In other words, top tier status as long as the program recognizes rock bottom fares for full elite status.

For flights across the Pacific to the US, the carrier options are pretty much limited to Qantas (OneWorld) and Air New Zealand.

Personally I'd probably join United's Mileage Plus. At 100,000 miles they'll be 1K flyers and earn Systemwide Upgrades for international upgrades (some years good on any fare). That could help them fly AKL-SYD and then SYD-LAX/SFO on UA metal, upgraded to C. And they'll have no problem upgrading their domestic US segments.. (and will have gobs of leftover US upgrades, which they can give to you). Plus UA is pretty good for award redemption.

But there no doublt will be NZ and QF partisans. It's hard to argue against NZ, being AKL based and all. However, flying discounted fares they might not even make *A Gold, let alone top tier in NZ's program.

[This message has been edited by gleff (edited 10-25-2003).]