I am trying to decide which program to credit my miles into next year. CO will not match my status with OZ, while UA will give me an elite challenge to 1P(which gives the status upfront). One thing I am worried is the lifetime miles. CO will credit all EQM as lifetime miles, while UA does not.

There are some options I have:

1. Start from scratch. Build up with CO. I will save all lifetime miles. However, I will lose around 31k of bonus RDM. I will have to wait to get the benefit.

2. Do the challenge. Credit all the miles with UA. I will not lose 26k bonus RDM, but will lose quite a lot of lifetime miles(~40k) since I also fly with CO and OZ. I will enjoy the benefit right away.

3.Do the challenge. credit only enough miles to meet the requirements for the challenge. Credit all other miles back to CO. that will get all lifetime miles, but I will lose 31k of bonus RDM. I will enjoy the benefit right away. However, I will have to wait until when 2 program merge to get the miles in UA to count toward next year status.

I will fly enough to become 1K or CO Platinum.

What is your option? should I be worried about lifetime miles that much?

Thanks a lot!

At this point nobody knows what the combined MM program will be, and it doesn't look like you will be hitting 1MM by the end of next year. I'd suggest you go with UA.