Wingnut: Thanks for the input.

I'm flying Economy to the UK from AUS.

That comparison chart makes no sense to someone as illiterate in frequent flyer terms as I am.

I have no idea what "Paid 1st COS Bonus" is or whether 50% of it is better than 200%.

I'm not really sure what I want most out the rewards program. I just want to get as much as I can I guess.

I reckon lounge access would be pretty cool, but then so would free flights and upgrades. Being able to fly business or first class on a long flight like UK to AUS would be pretty sweet.

A big thing for me is that apart from the occassional (maybe once a year) flight to aus I'm planning on doing most of my flying as trips from the UK to Europe or wherever else I can get to on nice cheap fares.

I'm a CC junkie. We live off our CC's and pay them off each month, so a program that rewards us for this would be great.

Hmm I realise all my questions are pretty vague. I'll give some solid questions.

Say all I was after was lounge access, which programme would give me gold status the easiest?

Can I get to Gold Status via bonuses from things like CC sign ups or do I have to actually fly the miles?

BraniffLuvr: If you learn anything cool post here or send me a message and I can do the same for you.