Best China FF Airline Program
 

Any thoughts on the best frequent flyer program for a Shanghai resident? Most flights will be within China, inter-Asia and to the US.

Thanks!

Since you're based in Shanghai, I'm guessing you may have to fly China Eastern a lot. I would keep a Cathay Pacific AsiaMiles account for this purpose. This will also offer a good option for mileage accrual on American Airlines and JAL.

I would recommend that you also open an account with a *A airline. UA comes to mind, since they have a mileage-earning agreement with Air China. LH is also an option, since they have mileage-earning agreements with not only Air China but also with Shanghai Airlines, but it is comparatively difficult to reach status on LH. I suppose it would depend on the classes of service you will fly.

Between the two accounts, this should cover a fair portion of your flying. Perhaps a SkyTeam account would be useful to cover the leftover international flights, or perhaps an account with China Southern (to round out the Big 3 of Chinese carriers).

Marco Polo vs. AsiaMiles
 

Thanks for your response! One additional question - what's the difference between Cathay Pacific's Marco Polo club and Asia Miles?

The two programs share the same base (same miles, earning rules, award redemption levels, etc.), but they have two important differences:

1. Marco Polo Club lets you earn elite status (for bonus miles, lounge access, possible upgrades, priority check-in, preferential treatment and the like), AsiaMiles will not let you earn status, no matter how much you fly

2. Joining AsiaMiles is free, joining the MPC will cost 50 USD. If you have any chance of making elite status, then MPC should be worth it, IMO. If you take out a Cathay Pacific co-branded credit card, you can join the MPC free of charge.

You can upgrade an AsiaMiles account to an MPC account at any time.

Compare the two programs here:

http://www.cathaypacific.com/cpa/en_INTL/ffp/mpo

http://www.cathaypacific.com/cpa/en_INTL/ffp/asiamiles

it really depends on where you live. for me (in beijing), there are very few places i can go that aren't served by ca or fm (they are partners) so i credit to ca as much as possible. on the downside, miles only seem to post about half the time, but that's just the way the ball bounces. maybe, i'll do better in 2007

China Southern
 

I admit, I don't know much about China FF programs. But I heard and experienced that China Southern is China's premier air carrier. ^

I'm sure it's not a bad idea, but China Southern is China Southern. For someone who mainly flies out of Shanghai, they offer limited options.

If you're based in Guangzhou, on the other hand, it's definitely worth looking into. BTW, China Southern flights can also be credited to Delta SkyMiles.

i've been meaning to update my eticket refund thread, which featured both ca and cz, because i recently got a bunch of rmb from ca (after 2 months of paperwork required to gain an exception to their silly policy). meanwhile, cz has yet to respond to a single piece of correspondence from me, even after i resorted to cc'ing powerful people.

based on this single incident, my opinion of cz is a bit sour. moreover, i haven't had any overwhelming positive experiences with cz to counterbalance the bad taste.

that said, as a matter of practicality, when i fly cz, i credit to nw and often get the y eqm bonus.

alex: cz, in its present form, is a conglomeration of a number of formerly independent airlines and is the largest carrier in the prc. while can is certainly their strongest market, they have a bunch of other hubs from which their dominance is similar (urc comes to mind).