Hello!

A friend of mine asked me a question which I am not able to answer because I normally only fly with Star Alliance members. Therefore I do not have a clue how to answer his question.

He has not joined any programm yet and he is flying on the 19th of April Stockholm-LHR-LAX with the cheapest not flexible economy class ticket on British Airways. The return flight is on the 1th of May.

He is a German based customer and always flying economy.
1. Which programm would you recommend is the best choice?
2. Are there any promotions he can use?
3. Is there a difference between the mileage credit within the onworld?

Any help is highly appreciated.
Many Thanks in advance! ^

Being an economy flyer there is not much choice. Most of OW FFP do not earn miles for the cheapest fares. If the traveler flies to the USA sometimes, then AA might be OK as all AA fares earn full miles and certain economy class fares on BA and IB earn 25% of actual miles. Otherwise, I would check LH or UA and just forget about the miles for the current trip.

duplicate post

But the AA frequent flyer programe give zero miles for trans Atlantic BA flights.

BA or Qantas will get some ff miles. Check if it costs $$ to join the BA or QF programe in Europe. If it is free join one of them to some miles credited. Could be of use in a few years time.

BAEC is free. Don't know about QF. Do you have to pay to join the QF program anywhere?

Au $82.50 to join QFFF in Australia. Free for Eu address

And if it is a non-full Economy fare, i.e. not in Y class, he should join QF and NOT BA.

On both he will now only get 25% of the miles flown, however if does it on BA EC he will get NO BA Tier Credits, but if he does it on QF FF he WILL get QF Status Credits.

The trip he is taking, plus a couple of other transatlantic/longhaul in his earning year (which starts the day he joins the programme), give him a good chance of getting Silver (OW Ruby) on QF (though he may have to fly QF at least once to get this), impossible for him to get Status if he puts it on a BA EC card.

And if he then flies QF he will get 100% of any miles flown even on cheapest ticket, while same flight on BA EC card would only get him 25%.

Put simply - If flying Economy a lot always pick QF FF over BA EC.

The only caveat I would put on this is that if he is not going to fly enough for status, and mainly flies out of Europe, he may wanna join BA as it is more local. But even then I might still go for QF myself.

See here for relevant QF FF programme details - http://www.qantas.com.au/fflyer/dyn/...ngPoints/index

AY gives 50% points in all discounted BA classes. Points are based on kms flown, not miles. Intra-Europe eco award is 40.000 points...

Could be an option for a european based person...?

Just wanted to add for clarity that AY points are ofcourse also good for OW awards so for example trip from Germany to Spain using BA is the same 40k AY points...

Thanks alot for the information. ^ Very useful...

Best wishes from Germany!