Do I stick with A3 after hitting *G
 

(1) What is your home airport? MEL
(2) What types of fares do you usually buy ?.Discount economy, occasionally full fare
(3) How many miles do you usually fly each year? 30-40K
(4) Do you have any kind of status at present? What is it?.None
(5) What is most important to you in a FFP?.Free lounge access, redemption
(6) Which routes do you fly most often?.Australia to Asia, ocassionally to Africa
(7) Preferred Airlines? Whatever works, but SQ and TG are often the most convenient for the destinations I most frequently travel to.
(8) Do you travel for work or pleasure?.Work. I can choose the airlines, but not the class.

My story is that I recently got a job that involves a bit of travel, mainly to developing countries, of which most are in Asia and occasionally Africa. I'll be doing three to four trips a year, around 11-15K each trip - so around 35-40K a year.

I'm pretty new to this, so apologies if I'm asking a dumb question and/or don't know some of the acronyms or lingo! I've looked up as much as I can to find the answers, but could use some expert advice.

Since I'm going to be spending a lot of time hanging around airports, lounge access is the priority for me. Of course, free upgrades to business are also a big deal, but I'm realistic enough to understand those will happen exceedingly rarely - probably never. I'll live with that!

I've already worked out that getting to the necessary Gold level - and staying there - with any FF program is unlikely on the miles I travel. Except, of course, with A3. That works out neatly with the airlines I'm most likely to be using for my Asian destinations, SQ and TG. (If anyone has any advice to the contrary, feel free to tell me). Oneworld (and then flying with Qantas often) would have worked too, especially since QF and Emirates can get me to Africa via Dubai, but there doesn't seem to be the same shortcut to Gold (or emerald) as Star has with A3..

I'm flying to Dhaka from Melbourne via Singapore with SQ next month and a few months later to Myanmar via Bangkok with TG - that's enough to get to *G right there. Voila, lounge access (and there are three Star lounges in my home airport of Melbourne alone).

Basically, I'm happy enough with that. Free travel with work is great, and getting into the lounges while I'm doing that makes it all a little easier. I know I'm never going to get upgraded with A3, but since I'm unlikely to get to gold with any other FF program that's not really a problem. It's never going to happen anyway. (Correct me if I'm wrong)

So all well and good. But now I'm wondering about redeeming my accrued miles. I'm happy to put all my miles onto M&B, but I suspect I'm not getting the best bang for my buck. I have a wife and a toddler that would love a holiday to Asia and FF miles may be able to contribute. I've compared redemption charts for A3, SQ and a few others - A3 does seem the worst of the lot, but not by very much. But I'm a newbie to this, so there are probably a lot of factors I don't realise.

So I guess I have a couple of questions. One is, once I get to to *G with A3 should I be moving to another FF program that offers better value on redemptions? And, if I do that, can I still use the lounges with my A3 *G membership? I've read a lot on the net about not being able to use the benefits of one Star membership while putting the points on to another, but it seems to be inconclusive on lounge access. Star's policy online just says you need a *G card and a BP with a Star airline, but I guess that may not be the whole story..

Any expert advice for me?

Cheers.

Best *A program choice help, infrequent India traveler
 

Background:

• My mom (LAX-based, does very little flying, and domestically uses Southwest). However, she does fly to India every 1-2 years and must fly into HYD. Normally she takes Singapore -- she likes the service and comfort in economy and layovers in Singapore are relatively painless.
• Her preference (for now) is to stick with Singapore. Different question/thread about switching routes/airlines.
• She was enrolled in Singapore's program but with the expiry she never has enough to be useful (she did manage to redeem for business SIN-HYD-SIN last year).
• *A does make sense to me for options. Round trip LAX-NRT-SIN-HYD is around 22,000 miles. So she will earn enough for something (Europe, domestic US, ?) every 2-3 trips.

Question:

• Which Star Alliance partner should she put miles into? With UA devaluation, I'm not sure.
• I thought about Aegean so she could get *A Gold in one trip and at lesat get lounges and nicer treatment on Singapore. But I looked at Aegean's redemption chart and I don't see any way to get to India on a partner; am I just misreading it?

Suggestions welcomed. She's booked on Singapore for a trip in 2014 so I'm trying to decide which program to put into her reservation.

Thanks.

I still love UA given that u can transfer points to it easily and redeem when needed. With most other *a partners, that's the hardest.

With Aegean only I just count those miles as wasted.

She can use Aegean miles to get to Europe or within the US, right? But she would also become *G right away which would give her a couple of years of expedited check in, boarding, and lounge access. (Heck, if she flies every two years and earns 22k miles, she'll keep Aegean *G forever?)

My default choice right now is UA, but she'll never hit the miles or spend for *G on UA.

But if the Aegean miles are useless (that's my question?) then the calculus changes. Why do you call them wasted?

abaheti
A question for http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/star-alliance-413/

Look & ask here: http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/star-...post-here.html

(1) What is your home airport? LAX through 5/2015, then in limbo potentially few months, then PDX or SFO most likely

(2) Do you currently have any status? UA Gold and if I hustle (probably won't) Platinum

(3) What types of fares do you usually buy? Almost exclusively discount economy <5cpm

(4) Which airlines/routes do you usually fly? UA domestically, main route LAX-ZFV. Have flown multiple revenue flights on Air Canada, Lufthansa, Turkish, Swiss this year. Used to fly a lot of US.

(5) How many miles do you usually fly each year? this year 65k minimum, last year (1st year in "game" and xcountry from my family) 25k

(6) Do you mainly fly for work or for leisure? / Do you have any flexibility in choosing the airline/fare bucket etc.? I'll call it leisure, I travel alone so flexible that way, only issue is one of my 3 semester breaks (yay, med school) is during holiday high period. A good time to use award miles if you can get it, though

(7) What is most important to you in a FFP? crazy award redeems in economy! On UA I just booked for 65k: LAX-BKK,with stopover in JNB/CPT, long layovers in MUC, PEK, HND during winter holidays. Awesome sauce though it did take me a long time to research

Other:
I am still building credit and don't qualify for miles cards yet, so most of my earnings come from butt-in-seat, in addition to surveys and promos. So I need the miles earned to go as far as possible.

Future travel: next year to PEK and TYO (2 different trips, looking like UA and/or Air China). LAX-ZFV and LAX-PDX a bunch of times. Open to a good fare to Alaska/Hawaii. One more big trip that could be revenue and any incidental mileage runs to cool places. Not sure about that PQD though...I don't know if I'd even qualify for silver.

Typically when I hear "infrequent flyer" mentioned, I would always look at a program that doesn't expire with minimal activity, this means North American programs. If you're only accumulating 22,000 miles every year or two then it's quite hard to use them if they expire in 3 years. UA's devaluation is unfortunate, but for redeeming for something is likely to be best, otherwise A3 as others have mentioned for *G.

Thanks. Let me ask a mod to move me vs cross-posting.

With Aegean you should check which booking class you buy on SQ - some cheaper tickets earns zero miles...

...but most mid priced economy tickets earn 100% miles, which is a lot better than with some carriers...

Hi All

I am a frequent flyer of OneWorld however still a modest silver due to most of my trips being economy within EU and only 1 - 2 business class trips per year to the US.

Due to an excellent business class rate achieved through Star Alliance for an upcoming Asia trip in January, I am looking for your advice as to which airline I should put the miles with... I have an SAS Eurobonus Basic card with about 3000 miles on it plus a United Miles and More accoount with just a handful of points but don't want to miss out on the points I can get for this trip. The schedule is as follows:

LHR - SIN (Via FRA) with Lufthansa

SIN - NRT with ANA

NRT - LHR with ANA

I am hoping that I can at least make silver status somewhere with this trip but just need your advice as to where... It is extremely confusing!

Thanks in advance

Dan

Hi everyone, I now have a Cathay diamond status but now that our company is going for the cheapest fares so need to fly on other airlines now. Can anyone give me some advice on which Star Alliance airline to join? Have now a Lufthansa card from way back but want to make a good choice based on your suggestion so ready to sign up for a new airline membership. Thank you!

(1) What is your home airport? (SFO, LAX, MCO, etc.) : Hong Kong
(2) What types of fares do you usually buy ? (C, F, Y, etc.) Now within 6 hours all economy Y
(3) How many miles do you usually fly each year? (<25K, 25k-50k, >50k) : 80k-120k
(4) Do you have any kind of status at present? What is it? (UA Premier, M&M Senator etc): One World Cathay Pacific Diamond
(5) What is most important to you in a FFP? (Frequent upgrades on travel, priority services when flying the airline, good award redemption rates, free lounge access, etc.): free lounge access, good award redemption
(6) Which routes do you fly most often (US Domestic, Transpacific etc): Hong Kong to countries in Asia (India, Indonesia, Malaysia, JP, KR, Shanghai, Taiwan, etc..) and twice a year to HK - Frankfurt, redeem flights HK- Taiwan
(7) Preferred Airlines
(8) Do you travel for work or pleasure? (Can you chooose your airlines, class of service?) - mainly for work, can't choose anymore due to cost control

With the merger of US and AA, I need another Star Alliance program in which to deposit miles. In February I will be flying to BOG and PEI from JFK.

I would like to know if AV has a good FFP for me. I reside in NYC but will be traveling often through out Central and South America during the next few years. I normally fly DL or AA to Latin America but I started to think that a Latin American based program may be better.


Thank you for any info you may provide.

What are you looking to gain? low redemption costs? upgrades? How many miles do you think you can fly on *A?

Is it a United Mileage Plus or LH Miles & More? You created a hybrid in your post ;)