SEA
Econ & econ plus
<25k
​​​​​​no status
desire award bookings, a place to collect miles

I have a decent number of miles in both sky and one world without status.

Lately I want to travel to places on airlines not connected to OW and Sky i.e. Singapore and air Canada

Seems Asiana Turkish Aegean and yes JetBlue are best bets. Pluses include fewer miles, not having to fly on their metal, more ways to earn etc.

Thank you for your help. I'm getting back into travel with all the new changes


I have Ruby status with OW. I am member of AS AA and Delta. That is where miles are from long ago. I would like to take flights on Turkish and Singapore to name a couple. Hence the reason for wanting Star Alliance. I don't fly on UA metal.

1. Jetblue is not part of *A
2. How frequently will you be taking *A? Are you aware of the mile expiration policies for all the *A programs?
3. Where do you want to travel with the awards? Airlines will have the best award availability for their own flights. For partners, they are dependent on partner award availability being released.
4. If you just want a place to accrue miles, I'd recommend UA, given no mileage expiration

What Skyteam & OW airlines are you a member of?
Some alliance airlines have other airlines as freq flyer partners
e.g AA and Jetlbue; UA & EK, AS and KE/SQ.

Some cheap flights can earn nil ff miles. Check the fine details
A guide--> https://www.wheretocredit.com/

With few flights need to consider ff miles expiration
Link--> Miles/Points that Do and Don't Expire
Agree UA, with no miles expiration, is good place to hold ff miles from Star Airlines & UA partners

With few flights saving cash on tickets will be more than the "value' you will get from ff miles. Best not to consider ff miles that much when purchasing. Just something that may or may not be used/of value in the future.

(1) What is your home airport? SFO
(2) What types of fares do you usually buy? Economy, Economy Plus
(3) How many miles do you usually fly each year? ~50K
(4) Do you have any kind of status at present? What is it? Have SAS Gold (formerly Diamond), but dissatisfied because there is always close to zero redemption inventory
(5) What is most important to you in a FFP? #1 Good redemption (points cost relative to points earn, availability), #2 upgrades, #3 lounge access
(6) Which routes do you fly most often? SFO to SYD, YVR, LHR. Some US domestic, but mostly international
(7) Preferred Airlines Often fly United, Air Canada, Air NZ
(8) Do you travel for work or pleasure? Both, more often for work
Credit card: Chase Sapphire Reserve
Hotels: Hyatt

(1) What is your home airport? BWI/DCA/IAD
(2) What types of fares do you usually buy ? Y
(3) How many miles do you usually fly each year? (<25K)
(4) Do you have any kind of status at present? What is it? (Avianca RedPlus)
(5) What is most important to you in a FFP? (Lounge Access is not important. Low-cost reward travel and upgrades on paid travel are our priorities)
(6) Which routes do you fly most often (US domestic, US--Latin America, Transatlantic to Europe)
(7) Preferred Airlines My in-laws live in Bolivia, so we prefer Avianca, CopaAir or AA/BoA because those are the only airlines with 1 stop service between WAS and VVI.
(8) Do you travel for work or pleasure? (Lesiure, perhaps one domestic US flight per year for work to attend a conference)

We take vacations in Europe or Latin America every year and we also visit my in-laws live in Bolivia at least once every year. Given the proximity of United's hub at IAD and the one-stop service to Bolivia available on Copa and Avianca, it seemed like it made sense to be loyal to *A, but I am still relatively new to FF programs, so I might be wrong here. For instance, I do fly BWI-BOS to visit my parents frequently (4x/yr), so I sometimes end up accumulating TrueBlue points with JetBlue, which is a partner of AA, and AA codeshares with BoA to offer one-top service to Bolivia from WAS. SouthWest also flies that route, so I also end up with RapidRewards points too. Neither my wife nor I flies much for work apart from a single domestic flight each year to attend a conference.

I also have no idea whether it makes sense to earn miles with an airline that I actually fly such as United or a Latin American carrier or whether it makes sense to earn miles with a loyalty program with an airline that we fly less frequently (if at all). It seems like a lot of people are using Air Canada Aeroplan, Turkish Miles&Smiles or Aegean Miles+Bonus FF programs without actually flying on those airlines all that much, but I don't know why.

We accumulate a large number of miles with our CapitalOne Venture X Card, but I don't think the transferred miles will help us earn any sort of status with any airline. Right now, we've been favoring Avianca because Copa is not a transfer partner with CapitalOne, but I don't know if there's anything else important that distinguishes LifeMiles from ConnectMiles. Complimentary Priority Pass is included with the credit card, so earning lounge access with FF miles is not important to us right now. It looks like partner reward tickets often require fewer LifeMiles than MileagePlus miles, particularly when it comes to flying TransAtlantic from Dulles to Europe, but at the expense of fewer available flights.

If you mostly fly international, I see no reason to not accrue status with United. Is the goal to redeem points for those SFO-SYD/YVR/LHR flights? Airlines have better award availability for their own flights. Additionally, if you get to high status levels, you get a very good multiplier on points earning.

Be aware that upgrades are primarily a US phenomenon, for foreign airlines, expect to fly in the cabin that you paid for. Where do you want award flights to?
Would you consider yourselves price sensitive?

Airlines have access to select award availability on alliance partners, and airlines also have different pricing for awards. Aeroplan has a large number of partners and attractive pricing, and both the Turkish and Aegean programs make it relatively early to earn Star Alliance Gold status.

Transferring miles does not usually count towards status. Note that airlines have better award availability for their own flights, so Avianca Lifemiles has access to less award seats than United Mileage plus on United flights from IAD to Europe. Also, do pay attention to mile expiration policies. United miles don't expire which is nice for many, but they also aren't a transfer partner for Capital One.

Hi all
I currently have a platinum Iberia Plus status, however in my current job, *A airlines are usually better for the destinations I am flying, so I am considering switching the FFP for a *A one.
Lufthansa is usually the best options for work flights towards the east (middle east or Asia), however I'd like to use miles usually to go to the west (US or latin america)
Details are below

(1) What is your home airport? TLS (France)
(2) What types of fares do you usually buy ? usually business class for international flights
(3) How many miles do you usually fly each year? 40-50K
(4) Do you have any kind of status at present? What is it? Iberia Plus platinum, Miles and More Frequent Flyer
(5) What is most important to you in a FFP? award redemption for private flights, access to the lounges
(6) Which routes do you fly most often Europe to Middle East or Asia
(7) Preferred Airlines - Lufthansa
(8) Do you travel for work or pleasure? usually for work

Also I have register with United Mileage plus and requested a status match and they agreed to grant platinum status for 4 months and request that I fly 12 flights with United during those 4 months, which will not happen...

SFO-SYD/YVR/LHR is for work, I'd redeem for personal family vacations departing from SFO on a mix on *A carriers (probably skewed towards UA, but not necessarily).

If you're going to redeem *A-wide, what programs tend to work well?

Another wrinkle: I think I may unofficially have lifetime Gold with SAS due to an extreme amount of J flying I did with them in the past. It's been a few years since I flew SAS, my status was progressively downgraded each year until Gold, then stayed at Gold for the past few years, so maybe it's here to stay? I'm dissatisfied that SAS's availability on their own flights is essentially zero, but I could redeem for partner flights. Also dislike that my earn for short UA Y flights is roughly zero with Eurobonus despite status (though I guess they would never amount to much in any program)

So should I stick with SAS, or should I credit to United (or another) carrier, where I'll presumably get some status anyway with ~50K of Y flights?

Most *A programs have access to the same inventory. SQ plays games where it restricts business class inventory to specific partners.

You are aware of how (almost) everything with UA is about how much you spend right?

Award redemption for private flights? If you're buying business class, that will already include lounge access.
Generally accruing status with Miles and More is not a very popular choice given their very high surcharges on award tickets. If you aren't flying UA regularly, then getting UA status will be difficult.

Hello everyone. I am an American based in Riyadh, KSA. Me and my family (5 total) fly round trip from Riyadh to Houston at least twice a year on business class, so between the credit card spend and the flights themselves, we have an opportunity to earn a good chunk of miles. For the last year we have been flying Emirates, and I have achieved platinum status. We like Emirates because the experience is always great, the flight is comfortable, the Dubai airport is nice and the lounge is nice. However, I have found it nearly impossible to use my Skywards points because of low award flight availability and even when I do find a flight, the fuel surcharges make it almost not worth using the points. It's important to me to be able to use my points to get free/low cost award flights for me and my family's annual holidays.

Using websites like point.me, I see lots of availability of low-cost award flights from Riyadh to good vacation destinations using AAdvantage miles, so I've thought about switching to earning AAdvantage miles either by booking directly through AA or flying Qatar or BA and crediting points to AA. Or could stick with United since we are based in Houston, but we would have to fly home via Lufthansa or Turkish, which are not as good of an option as Qatar Airways. I do earn miles with my Chase card so can always transfer to United. Maybe a split scenario when I earn some Chase points and some AA points makes sense? A bit of a complicated scenario, Would appreciate the help. There's just so many options I don't know what's best.

I do most of my daily spend on Chase Sapphire Preferred card and have a bunch of Ultimate Reward Points. Also have the Venture X card and have a couple hundred thousand points there. I have booked travel through their portals before to get the 5x points, but I find that making flight changes when I do this is a huge pain. Have thought about Amex Platinum to ge the 5x points when booking direct, but not sure if their transfer partners are the best for me. Not opposed to getting another credit card but am too busy these days to watch every dollar I spend and am kind of over the churning thing. Just want to manage 1 or 2 cards at most.

Questions
(1) What is most important to you in a FFP?
Ability to use points for award flights or upgrades with low fuel surcharges. My company pays for our flights from Riyadh to Houston, so I'd like to use the points I earn for other trips throughout the year to interesting locations in Europe and Asia for little to no cash. Lounge access also important, but we have Priority Pass so we usually get some sort of lounge access even when flying economy and will get lounge access regardless when flying business.

(2) How many miles do you usually fly each year & in what class? How many flights/sectors?
Reply: At least twice per year RUH-IAH which is about 32,000 miles in J class per year per person. Then a few other trips per year in Economy class. When in the USA we go to Denver and Orlando frequently.

(3) What types of fares do you usually buy?
Reply: Business class for long haul and economy for shorter trips. Would fly business more if award availability made sense.

(4) Can you choose your airlines and/or class of service? Do you travel for work and/or pleasure?
Reply: Yes, I can choose. Usually traveling for pleasure.

(5) Which routes and airlines do you fly most often?
Reply: RUH-IAH, IAH-DEN (frontier because it's cheap, but am brand agnostic), IAH-MCO (united, but am brand agnostic)

(6) What is your home airport?
Reply: RUH, IAH

(7) Do you have FFP status of any kind in OW or other airline? What is it? Do you have any miles banked in a FFP?
Reply: Emirates Platinum. Have lots of Chase Ultimate Rewards and Capital One points saved up. Some miles in Untied as well.

(8) Preferred Airlines? Most common Airlines flown on?
Reply: Like the idea of Qatar Airways for our long trips to the states since their business class looks nice. Need to be on a good Business class product for those two flights home since those flights are very stressful with three small children and I like that experience to be good for my family. Enjoy our Emirates flights, but like I said the points are worthless. I do NOT want to fly Saudia.

Thanks for the help. Please let me know if flying Qatar and crediting points to AA makes sense or if there's a better option within Star Alliance.

Thank you for your response, angetenar. For us, future international destinations include Scotland, England, Ireland, Spain, Portual, Mexico, Guatemala, Peru, Chile, Argentina and India. We also want to vacation within the US (LAX,SEA,DEN) too, which makes it hard for us to decide between LifeMiles and MileagePlus. We are somewhat price sensitive; we won't be shelling out $ to fly in the front of the cabin anytime soon, though we do pay extra for "L" seats on Avianca when we fly to Bolivia and we are tempted at the prospect of using miles to purchase J or F tickets when we fly to Europe. We'd never let the price of an airline ticket to dictate where we choose to go on vacation. Nonetheless, I have chosen Avianca for our previous two flights to Bolivia because they had the lowest price even though the timing of BoA's MIA-VVI flight is preferable as it means we avoid having to be awake at 3am to go through Bolivian customs.

yes access lounge when flying economy for leisure!
yes I realize that, hence my question... however I've used miles for partial payment of tickets in the past but I don't know if M&M is interesting in this case

so what would be the recommendation of FFP in *A? Maybe Turkish? even if it is unlikely that I will fly with them...

Ok so for lounge access when flying economy, the main thing will be the easiest program to get star gold with. There's a thread in this forum about that, have you looked at it? Aegean is pretty easy if you can fly a few Aegean segments every year.