Hi there,

I am new to the mileage reward program and I am lost. Almost every airline is a partner of some bigger program. For example, UA is a partner of Star Alliance Network and Mileage Plus Airline. Northwest has its partner. Hawaiian airline is a partner of both Northwest and UA. .......

I am so lost. It seems like you can basically fly on any airline and transfer credit to each other. Who can provide me some clearance about this issue? What is the best stratagem?

Thank you very much.

First, welcome to Flyertalk!

You are right, it can be very confusing.

You may want to start by reading the Alliance Forums.... that is the best place to learn about the different alliances and benefits and pitfalls.

At a minimum, you probably want to pick one airline/alliance and center your travel with them. That will depend on your flying patterns and home airport. If you provide some of that detail, people here will be more than willing to assist.

It gets even better... you can actually get some bonuses for hotels, cars and credit card spend and buying flowers and candy applied as miles to your accounts...

Welcome to Flyer Talk.

There are three alliances- Star Alliance, Skyteam, and Oneworld. Most people here are a member of at least one airline program in each alliance. This will allow you to earn miles on almost every major airline in the world. For me, I prefer DL (Skyteam), AA (Oneworld), and US (Star Alliance).


In order to choose which airline programs are best for you, you will have to see what airlines use your area airport. A person in ATL would choose Delta because ATL is Delta's HQ. Someone in Chicago can choose UA or AA. Someone in NY, with many airlines, will base their decison on their travel habits and personal reasons.

The key is to put all the miles you can in ONE program so that you can earn free flights or status faster.


Hope that helps!

Thanks for the reply.

I live in San Diego. Which allian do you suggest?

Where do you travel to the most? That can have an impact on our advice.

think about where you will fly, how often, class,....from now thru 2010.....that might point to an alliance.....good luck

San Diego, To hawaii, Houston, East coast, San Francisco

any guesses on intl visits?.....good luck...

Hmmm....I'm no expert on SAN in particular, but that seems like it might be a UA/CO fit. (Star Alliance)

Houston is a primary CO hub.

SFO is a secondary UA hub. (Lots of flights, but not quite ORD or DEN.)

I think if you definitely want to fly out of SAN (and not LAX), you'd be mostly looking at one-stop to get to a lot of East Coast markets, but UA through DEN or CO through IAH would be as logical as anything else. (LAX of course would give you more nonstops and might make AA/Oneworld more attractive to you as well.)

Personally, I've always accrued miles on UA. The biggest "pros" for UA are Economy Plus and very affordable systemwide upgrades if you are a very frequent flier (100k miles per year). A downside to UA is that they have been known to filter out the best partner awards - even when the partner airline has made award seats available (referred to often on the UA board as Starnet blocking). CO has pledged not to Starnet block after they join the alliance, but other than that I know little about them.

Thank you guys very much. Your inputs are really helpful.

what al ff programs do you have miles on? how many? it might make sense to try to get enough for an award ticket on the 1 w/the most mi's....good luck...

Welcome!

One word of advice - you state in your first post that it "It seems like you can basically fly on any airline and transfer credit to each other"

I just wanted to clarify that you dont necessarily transfer your mileage back and forth, you pick a program before departure and credit your mileage there. For instance, United is a partner with US Airways. If you fly on US Airways, you can choose, prior to departure to deposit the mileage earned into United because they are partners. You cannot, however, fly US Airways, deposit the mileage on US Airways and then at a later date transfer your miles to United when you want to redeem an award. Transfers between airlines can sometimes be done, but not without great devaluation. I apologize if you already knew this - I may have misinterpreted your first post.

I agree with the advice earlier, it looks like UA or CO would be the choice for you. After late October they will both be in Star Alliance. In that case, pick one of them as your main FFP, and anytime you fly UA or CO (or any other Star carrier) credit the mileage to that account.