Seattle Airlines
 

I am being transferded to Seattle and was wondering if anyone has any suggestions as to which airline I should sign up for the frequent flier program. Are there any airlines that dominate the airport?

A frequent and accurate response to this type of question is "depends". I believe the most seats flown in and out belong the Alaska Air group, which includes Horizon Air. They do have a good FF program which allows you to fly and collect miles on several airlines. But if you have specific destinations you have to travel to then I would check which airlines provide you with the best coverage, frequency and cost. That is my 2 cents.

What's your flying going to be like? Domestic? International? What are your most frequent destinations? As mentioned above, AS is the dominant carrier, check out http://www.alaskaair.com/mileageplan/ for information on their FF program. Other carriers may work better for you though depending on your flying patterns.

Where do you fly most?
 

Welcome to FlyerTalk, jomuggs!

I think the answer to your question would depend upon where you're going to be traveling.

But, saying that, I'd suggest looking at Alaska Airlines (that airline's HQ is in Seattle and SEA is their major hub) or one of the airlines that have partnerships with Alaska. You can fly on Alaska's flights and earn miles on your choice of several different carriers, and vice versa. You can find more details at www.alaskaair.com and on the Alaska Airlines forum here on FlyerTalk.

Infrequent flyers should definitely consider Alaska Airlines' program because you can get miles for Alaska (the airline with far more flights than the 2nd busiest at SEA), American, Delta, Northwest, Continental, and some other foreign airlines.

If you plan to fly a lot and want upgrades, then you have to fly that carrier a lot. So if you're flying to Atlanta a lot, DL is clearly the choice. For cities, like Miami, DL might still be the choice because of the schedule. Maybe AA might also be, but check their schedules.

Don't laugh at Southwest. They now have better service than some legacy carriers (formerly called full service carriers). Their ff program is primarily for people who want domestic coach awards. Their award seat inventory is much better than most airlines. They also have lots of service to Oakland and decent service to the West Coast, but not quite as convenient as Alaska.

Welcome to FT and to the Pacific NW! Make sure you check out Community as we usually have a monthly dinner meeting with each other; hopefully you can join us!

As others have said, Alaska has the most frequent service from SEA but I fly UA most often since they have more service to cities east of the Cascades. If you decide to go with AS make sure you sign up for their VISA card - it's excellent and Bank of America has a AS debit card that allows you to earn miles as well. AS has a great ff program with the 1/2 off mileage awards as well as their code share with CX. If you have any questions re: Seattle you can always PM (private message) me.

As others have said, Alaska Airlines has a big presence in Seattle, plus many mileage partner airlines (basically, both the US-domestic One World airline (American) and Sky Team airlines (Continental, Delta, Northwest, plus various other airlines).

If some other airline (particularly a Star Alliance airline like United, US Airways, or Air Canada) matches up with your flying better, you may still want to have an Alaska Airlines account to collect miscellaneous miles for when you primary airline's flights are not suitable.