Hi there!

I've just hoped on the flyer rewards band wagon with a NAB Velocity Rewards card. I've read that the US rewards programs give you more bang for your rewards points bucks, so to speak, but I'm baffled as to how to sign up for said US rewards programs when I'm all the way here in Australia. I've done a search on these forums and I'm proberly not putting the correct search words in because I've come up with zip. So how do I sign up for the US rewards programs?

Wirelessly posted (BlackBerry: BlackBerry8530/5.0.0.1030 Profile/MIDP-2.1 Configuration/CLDC-1.1 VendorID/417)

Welcome to FT!

What exactly do you mean by a "US rewards program"?

Most U.S.-based airline frequent-flyer and hotel frequent-guest programs allow people from other countries to join.

If, on the other hand, you're asking how you can qualify for a U.S.-issued credit card that awards points or miles, the answer is that you probably cannot -- until you establish residence in the U.S.

You can sign up for any of the US airline reward programs at their respective websites (united.com, aa.com, etc.) and earn miles by putting your new frequent flier number in any reservations you have with partner airlines (as long as it is a miles earning fare for that partner). You can't sign up for US credit cards without a US address and credit score, however, which is what much of the miles earning discussion focuses on here. There are Australian credit cards that earn miles, but I'm not familiar with them. It is true that the US airline cards tend to offer much more generous signup bonuses than those issued in other countries. If you are just looking for programs to store you miles earned from flying, however, sign up for whatever airline(s) that partner with the airline(s) you fly that you'd like to earn miles in and start accumulating.

Beat me to it

Sellty Welcome to FT Aussie branch
You can sign up to most ffp's with an Australian address. British Airways is one exception that does not Australian / NZ address. May be others

AA (and others) works QF flights. Many if us in Oz use AA ffp due to better award cost

Virgin Australia is a partner or EY, DL and some others. The VA ffp is better than QF ffp in some ways.

Getting points/miles from Australian credit cards to USA airline ffp's is limited.

All FFP's are all different.
- Frequent spending (credit card miles/points) is not the same as frequent flying
- Many ffp's have a requirement you fly 4 flights with then to get status.
- Effectively you cannot move miles/points from 1 ffp to another. So you are stuck with VA points
- Be careful of miles expiry.

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/infor...help-here.html

Have a look here http://www.australianfrequentflyer.com.au/community

Note: (for those not in Aussie)
NAB = National Australia Bank
Velocity = Virgin Australia's ffp (not the same as other the Virgin airline ffp's)