NWA/Skyteam question
 

OK, so I am not someone who travels for business and when I fly for leisure, I usually try to stick to the same airline/alliance to get points accumulated quicker.

For some long-forgotten reason, my choice became NWA and just a few weeks ago I finally crossed the 25,000 miles plateau (I know, peanuts for all of you guys, but, once again, I don't fly that much). I used to live in Nashville but moved to New York this summer, and between this past July and this upcoming x-mass, I have/will take three flights. Two to Nashville, one to the UK. All on Delta, since JFK is the hub.

Considering that NYC is a hub for both Delta and Continental, it's kind of easy to keep earning WorldPerks, though I do feel like I'm missing out on getting skymiles and bonuses from Delta, considering I fly with them more. My question is, should I keep accumulating miles on NWA (I'll probably have slightly over 30,000 miles by the end of the year. Maybe around 35,000)? Or should I, after this year is over, switch to another program? I am most interested in earning some miles to eventually get a free flight to Australia, though I don't think Skyteam is the best alliance for that trip. I also have family in Russia, and I do fly there once a year or so on Aeroflot or Delta, so I could keep earning the miles.

I do have a FF account with AA and United, but I don't have more than 4,000 miles in each. I'm not interested in opening a credit card from Chase to boost my miles level to 25000 with United (I know, sad). What would you all recommend? Stay with NWA and keep earning and getting enough pts for an international awards ticket and somehow routing it all to get to Australia or switch and focus on flying only on United or AA?

Thank ya

All that I'm going to say is premised on NW still being a viable business. If they resolve their problems with the FA's, then they can probably still stay in business. In which case, I think that if your primary FF goal is earning RDMs for future trips, NW WorldPerks is a better program than either CO OnePass or DL Skymiles.

Two major reasons:
1) If you're flying the "home" airline, in this case NW, you're more likely to have to connect no matter where you're going, unless you're going to MSP, DTW, or MEM. That means more miles from the connecting flights, as long as you avoid the dreaded "direct" flights.

2) Promos. Promos for extra RDM earnings seem far more generous, especially if you make use of partner non-air earnings such as hotels, cars, online shopping. NW typically runs two or more big promos a year where either by explicit miles bonuses (e.g. the just-ended Bonus Play promo) or by points-based promos (e.g. the current MilesSafari, or early this year's 100,000 Mile Dash, or last year's Extreme Miles). I've gotten tens of thousands of RDMs from these promos even though I only started working NW WP serious barely a year ago.

Also it seems that NW has at least as good low-level (PerkSaver) availability than does OnePass or SkyMiles.

But if NW fails, where its miles go if anywhere is a crapshoot. So I'm in dual earn and burn mode, where I don't hold onto their miles for all that long before redeeming and flying. If you assume NW will stick around, or its program miles will be accquired the same as AA did TW or DL did PA years ago, then it's worth it.

Forgetting the NW survives/fails dimension, there are some reasons why CO might be better.

1. Unless you are crediting miles to OnePass, you have no way to get full EQMs on deep discount fares flown on CO. Since you're in NYC, CO may be the most convenient to fly, but you'll only get 50% EQMs on CO in NW's or DL's programs, even if you purchase on continental.com. If you purchase at CO online and credit to OnePass, you get full EQMs on all fares. Given your travel patterns just barely bring you to low-tier elite level, you might need these to maintain elite status.

2. Upgrades might not be your top priority, but they're nice to have. If you'll be flying CO a lot, you're more likely to get an upgrade on CO as a CO elite at a given level than as an NW elite. I believe that CO Silvers get upgraded ahead of NW Silvers on CO. Reverse is true of course if you're mostly flying NW.

Since you say you currently fly DL most, then maybe DL is your best bet. You'll get the chance at upgrades (but only on DL, no reciprocity with CO/NW). You also won't have the agony of trying to get the DL call center to properly input a different Skyteam FF# and assign elite area seats.

But I think you'll earn the most RDMs in NW if you use the promos bigtime.

I know, no single answer, sorry. But hopefully the pros/cons help your decision.

Try Air France
 

If you looking for an airline program, but worried about the longevity of them (NW bankrupcy, Delta bankrupcy,etc.) you might want to consider another airline that is more along the lines of a national airline such as Air France or even Aeroflot. The likelyhood that these airlines to go under are less likely since they are the major airline of that country. I travel roughly 45,000 per year, and have had a very good experience with Air France, other than their food! LOL But I think that is with all airlines! LOL But I travel to Romania regularly on business and transfer to Tarom (Another national airline) and have had a wonderful experience with Tarom!

Thanks for such a thoughtful answer. I guess that was one of my concerns. I am well aware of NWA's financial problems. As far as creature comforts go, they are one of the worst airlines I've flown domestically. But that aside, they do have lots of promos, and I frequently buy stuff on line through their World Perks mall, which brings me additional miles.

I guess considering that it takes me a long time to get to the level needed to gain reward tickets, I may as well continue using NW, while adding to my AA or United accounts little by little.

In regards to the last poster's suggestion on using carriers like Aeroflot or Air France, that is an interesting thought, but I don't think that transferring miles from domestic flights into those accounts would be very efficient. But I don't know if I am right on that. Anyway, it seems from the majority of posts that AA, UA and CO are the most popular FF options.

Ah, Tarom the queen of the sky, the airline where you can bribe the FA to smoke in the rear galley!!!!

Do not join Flying Blue if you ever want to redeem miles. They charge outrages taxes and fees on award tickets. I'm originally from Kiev so we go to KBP a lot. BOS-KBP tickets from NWA.com (but flying on KLM) are roughly $100 in taxes, where as BOS-KBP on KLM flying blue award tickets is $450. You don't want to pay that much in taxes for an award. Until AF and KLM can get things together it's a pretty useless program.

You might also look at Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan - you get 100% EQMs on both NW and DL, and you can book with miles on either of those or AA - 25,000 miles for a partner Saver fare. I think Alaska MVPs/Golds are treated pretty well on the other airlines as well.

Air France and KLM will reward you for flying other airlines
 

This is not nescessarily true.
You can get a round trip transatlantic with connections award ticket for €31 - as long as your trip originates in North America. Which is the case for the OP.
Also, there are no problems whatsoever by earning FB (AF and KL) miles on US domestic travel. You get 100% on all CO fares, 100% on all SU fares, 100% on all DL fares, 100% on all NW fares except V (25%), and avoid flying KL or AF :D

That's what I do.

It seems to me that the most important consideration would be the ease of getting an award ticket. I would burn the 25,000 on a domestic ticket and then accumlate on Alaska Airlines. It is very easy to get a ticket most anywhere in the world from that airline. American and Hawaiian are partners of Alaska, so it's also easy to get a domestic ticket, or a ticket to Hawaii or Alaska. (The latter is highly recommended for everyone.) And Alaska is not bankrupt and not likely to go bankrupt.

The only problems with Alaska are that your entire round trip flight must be on one airline, and stopovers are prohibited unless necessary to get there. (I haven't tried open jaw with them yet.)

My second choice for accumulation would be Delta.

It is almost impossible to get award tickets from Continental or Northwest.

Really???

My Total Mileage Since Enrollment = 1,248,500M and I've redeemed all but 40K of that on award tickets. Everything from standard domestic for friends, standard First awards for friends, Int'l standard for family, RuleBuster for family and Int'l upgrades for myself.

Although half was RuleBuster, I flew 2 members of my family to Paris at Christmas last year using my WorldPerks miles.

"It is almost impossible to get award tickets from Continental or Northwest."

Really???

Just gifted two tix for Spring break xxx-DTW-FLL(NW) + return on DL in F at 47k & found availability out the wazoo for my Fri-Sat dates.
Yeah, a bit steep, but way better than the $800 V fares, and the look on the faces (for F) was priceless. ^

-

It's tough to get to Australia on miles with Skyteam. It can be done, but it's not easy.

If the goal is really Australia, I'd switch to flying UA or AA (probably AA, since they have a much larger presence in NYC).

Otherwise, I don't think there's much wrong with sticking with NW in NYC. If you think you're going to be flying either DL or CO significantly more than NW, then you might want to consider switching to one of those programs for the banked mile bonuses. But otherwise I don't think there's that big a difference between the programs.

When airlines become partners, why in marketing, don't they grant recipocity on their partner airline? You are sometimes put on those flights when you reserve a flight and it helps them out. Why wouldn't they want to keep the passenger happy? I know it comes down to $ and cents but some of us hate being treated like cattle.

There are three reasons for not granting complete reciprocity. (1) It's a bureaucratic nightmare to synchronize benefits across multiple airlines (just look at how much trouble Skyteam carriers already have just getting "preferred" seating to partner elites--now imagine if they were supposed to do upgrades, too). (2) Airlines want to give their FFers an incentive to fly the "home team." (3) The more airlines that give reciprocity, the more dilluted elite benefits will be.

Hmm that's interesting about Alaska. So, one of the suggestions is to basically switch to Alaska and, even though I will likely never fly with them, be able to bank miles from flying with AA and then redeem them on AA or other carriers when booking award travel? I am thinking that I may as well just accumulate miles into an AA account, right?

The big advantage to AS is that you can earn/redeem miles on AA, DL, NW and CO. Nobody else has that many domestic partners. You can also redeem on Qantas if Australia is your goal.

The downside to AS is if you never fly AS, you will get very minimal elite benefits if you make elite. But if you don't think you'll be making elite any time soon, who cares?

The other downside is that on Alaska you must fly your entire trip on the same airline. On American you may fly on combinations of partners. For example, last year I needed to get to the Big Island of Hawaii on a certain date and return on a certain date. American could do that by flying 3 segments on Hawaiian Airlines and 1 segment on on American. (Hawaiian was far superior, by the way. Free food!) Alaska had access to both airlines, but could not find an entire round trip on either one of them, and so could not accommodate me.

Also, Alaska will not allow stopovers, at least not on American, unless the stopover is necessary to complete the trip. On a trip to Belize this year, Alaska did give me a ticket to Belize with a stopover in Miami, but only because that trip could not be completed in one day on American flights. The trip could be completed in one day on Continental, but Continental award tickets were not available, as usual.

I would stay with NW. The only benefit to AS is that you'll get to fly AA and earn miles. How many times are AA that much cheaper than NW, CO, DL or AS? I'm a CO member and I haven't had to fly anyone other than those 4 all year. Plus with NW, you get great international awards, automatic upgrades on both NW and CO. NW also has great offers from time to time to earn extra miles.

Just to be clear, you're saying that AS is more restrictive in letting you redeem miles, right? You're not saying that AS is more restrictive in letting you earn miles, are you?

Either way, this is new info to me, and definitely interesting.

thanks!

Correct in one sense: You have to stay with one airline for your entire trip. But in another sense, they do have quite a few airlines from which to choose, and it appears that it will get much better. They say that soon we will be able to use Alaska miles to get tickets on Air France and KLM. That business class Air France ticket non-stop from San Francisco to Paris is really nice, and from there you can go to most anywhere in Europe. I believe that
so far that ticket is available only via Delta miles from U.S. Airlines miles programs.

I have found that availability on Alaska partners with Alaska miles is quite good. Usually they can get me to where I want to go.

I collect most of my miles on both American and Alaska. Next choices are United and Delta.

You can book pretty much any AF or KL flight in business class with DL, NW or CO miles (subject to availability, which is a big qualification). And I'd much rather take KL if going to points beyond AMS/CDG, since AMS is a far superior airport to transit. If going to PAR, however, SFO-CDG nonstop on AF can't be beat.

Actually depends on the route, and the phase of the moon too I guess. I ended up flying on AA for a few of my routine DEN-BOS laps this summer. During that time UA and US were asking about $420-450 R/T, NW and DL were at about $350 or so, CO was about the same with the problem of 50% EQM for non-OnePass ST programs (NW in my case). AA was $198-218.

I ended up going with LAN rather than AA as the program to accumulate into given I was flying LAN Argentina later in the year on a fare that doesn't earn on AA. But really, YMMV in terms of where to accumulate.

Your choice of where to accumulate might end up based on some oddball thing unique to your location, your planned paid travel (like my AEP-IGR LAN/4M trip) or planned awards. No one-size fits all.

AS does sound like a good program overall. Turns out they're a partner with LAN as well as NW, CO, etc. So I may just end up using my Chilean kilometers for a trip to Alaska. Or start flying AS and accumulate more into LA from their flights. All these partnerships make for weird bedfellows, don't they?

If the AS program meets your needs, with the restrictions on award stopovers etc. that others have pointed out, it could well be the best bet given the number of different RDM/EQM partners it has in different alliances.