Going to school overseas, best mileage program to join?
 

In the fall I'm going to be studying at the University of Edinburgh, and I was curious what the best FF program to join would be if I would be flying back and forth from Boston 4-5 times a year. Of course, this probably isn't enough to get to any status on most airlines, but perhaps some programs would award this more than others?

Thanks for the help

Going to school overseas, best mileage program to join?
 

8k miles round trip ( estimate) times 5 gets you silvers .....
Look fee the best connections and/ or fares first and then make a more informed decision

Going to school overseas, best mileage program to join?
 

Keep in mind some airlines won't give full credit for student tickets (e.g. USIT). I did well with United when studying in Europe, and the student travel agency at my school got me great deals.

Look at the threads linked in this post 9 http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/21923398-post9.html

Depends on what airline you fly. Do you have miles in any freq flyer program now?
Also consider transiting via an Eu city and not only LHR

...or gold with A3.

For OP's city pairs it seems that he might be better of with AA/BA rather than *A though.

Going to school overseas, best mileage program to join?
 

Don't forget as well, if you're like most American students at Edinburgh, you'll travel to the continent multiple times. If you stick with airlines in your FF program you might yourself on the doorstep of gold.

Good news/bad news:
Out of EDI, there's no real dominant carrier. The carriers that fly the most destinations are Ryanair and Easyjet (and like most students abroad in Europe, you may end up flying them more than you'd ever thought).
If you are going to be travelling around Europe a lot, no alliance really has the edge.
One issue to flag- for flying EDI-BOS, Aer Lingus is probably often going to be the cheapest option. You can credit Aer Lingus flights to United (50-75% on North America-Ireland, and 250 miles on some) and British Airways (reduced credit and no tier points).

If you go with Delta or United, you should make sure to use your school address, as you wont have to spend a minimum dollar amount to get elite status.

USAir flies from Edinburgh to the US, at least seasonally, and you can get to Boston via Philadelphia or Charlotte. Miles earned on these flights can be applied to AA now, and will eventually end up there in any case. Miles earned on BA flights can be applied to the AA program (though not to the US program). When redeeming miles for award travel, BA should be avoided because of prohibitively high fees, but flights on IB (which flies BOS-MAD), AB etc. are fine.

There's a lot of budget carriers out of EDI. In terms of mileage redemption, the majors are:

*A
EWR on UA
IST on TK
BRU on SN
FRA on LH
ARN on SK
YYZ on AC

OW
London on BA
BCN on VY via IB
DUB on EI via BA
SNN on EI via BA

SkyTeam
AMS on KL
LCY on WX via cityjet
CDG on KL

LHR on VS

I recommend BA for short intra European flights (Reward Flight Saver) and United for TATL to avoid fuel surcharges. And you might be able to get EI via BA but I was never able to.

Also keep in mind that the UK has a large air passenger duty on departures so it can actually be economical to fly to continental Europe, spend the weekend somewhere interesting, and then fly to the US.

Also, you should get a US AMEX now then do a global transfer to the UK. Recommend the 20,000 MR signup on The Preferred Rewards Gold card. Then once per year you can transfer to a US MR card at the currency conversion rate.

Wirelessly posted (BlackBerry: BlackBerry8530/5.0.0.601 Profile/MIDP-2.1 Configuration/CLDC-1.1 VendorID/417)

Note that for redemption purposes, BA Avios can provide excellent value for the OP's situation. BOS-SNN/DUB on EI costs only 12,500 Avios. Combine that with a cheap flight to EDI (or an Avios Reward Flight Saver redemption DUB-LON-EDI -- with or without a LON stopover -- for 4,500 Avios and relatively low fees), and you've got a great deal for a TATL flight.

So I've ended up signing up for Delta SkyMiles because a different trip I am taking to Europe on them should help earn miles. I decided that with the miles transferring between Delta, Virgin, KLM, and AF that it was going to be plenty useful, and the miles from the earlier trip would likely outweigh any advantages the other programs were offering.

Thanks for the help everyone, and I look forward to many exciting trip reports and travel stories in the near future.

1. SkyMiles are rarely redeemable.
2. If they are, then you'll encounter heavy fuel surcharges on itineraries from Europe.

My advice is to credit your Delta flight to Alaska then sign up for a real mileage program.

Eep! Remember you can't actually *transfer* miles, you can redeem on those airlines though. For transatlantic flights, there is very limited availability on Air France and there are higher fees related to Virgin Atlantic miles. There are very few low mile redemption opportunities on Delta, you'll see people referring to Skymiles as "Skypesos."

Well said http://www.alaskaair.com/content/mil...-overview.aspx
AS is a very good ffp with a wide range of partners

It does depend on your (and your parents'!) budget...

If you are looking for the cheapest possible economy class fares then I would not worry too much about the FFP and just make your travel on a purely transactional basis. That said, if you join either AA, BA or US you will be able to earn points on each of the others due to their oneworld membership.

If you have some discretionary spend and fancy travelling in business class but need to secure a good deal on the fare then I would recommend BA. Their upgrade-using-Avios deal is extremely good. It allows passengers to pay a premium economy fare of about USD 1,000-USD 1,500 and travel in business class for 10k Avios each way. You might need to do some work to secure reward seats but if you can get them this is a tremendous deal.

Four premium economy returns upgraded to business class on BA will earn you Silver in the Executive Club, equivalent to intermediate tier Sapphire in the oneworld hierarchy.

If you have the budget for business class or first class travel under regular fares then I suggest that you make your decision based on the product you like the look of the most. I can recommend BA as can many others but just as many will recommend another player.

Aside - travel around the UK

I believe that trains are the best way to get around the UK. You might want to sign up to East Coast's reward scheme, which gives points for every pound spent on rail travel (on any operator, not just East Coast) through their web site.