I'm trying to lay out an award trip for my wife and myself. I had thought of transferring points to CO while still able to do so from both Amex and Marriott programs.
Unfortunately, having looked at the *A reward chart, I see that it would require 180K/per person currently for a F seat to the TLV from ATL. That means I'm left with either paying 120K for *A J or 100K for the CO BF. Again, this is current with no guarantee there will not be an future alignment of point requirements.
The question then is, is there that great a difference between the two products as to warrant the cost difference?

Actual routing will be: ATL-TLV-PRG-ATL or
ATL-PRG-TLV-ATL

whichever turns to be more practical in terms of cost and flight hours of departure. I prefer not to be at airport at 0600 hrs. to catch a departing flight.

There is no universal *A reward chart. Each program has it's own requirements (and rules re routing, stopovers etc). What *A program are you looking to use?

The two routings given look to not be on *A unless you're missing some transit points.

From "Miles and More" on *A site:

I was led to a grid type chart entitled:

Miles and Fly-unlimited flexibility
Star Alliance Rewards

The number of miles you need depends on what *A program you are using miles from.
For example, United charges 140k miles from North America to Israel in first class, while SAS charges 170k miles.
United charges 115k miles for business class, while SAS charges 130k miles.

Which program are you planning to use miles from?

I do not belong to any *A program. My wife and I each have<10K miles in Sky Miles so we can walk away feeling no great loss. My points (miles) would be drawn from a combination of Amex and Marriott. Therefore, the question is whether to dump the requisite total into a CO account now or just before they jump the ST train. Would they then transfer the points to another *A member willingly or stay "nonepass" Currently, if one takes the maximum award from Marriott involving a Cat.7 hotel, one pays 270K points and receives 120K miles into a CO account. However, the same program will only yield 85K miles to a*A member. Similarly, AMEX will transfer points to CO currently, but none to *A members.

*A FF programs don't permit points transfers between programs, so if CO joins, you can't transfer the miles to a different *A program.

My only experience thusfar has been as a Sky Team member. As such, it was simple to request transfer to a partner airline and, space allowing, one could book award travel. Our last use was ATL-GVA on AF in F class. Cost was 100K/per. Is there no similar policy using *A? If this is true, than I will be limited to CO as the other members of *A have no arrangement with either AMEX or Marriott.

Once CO joins *A you can use onepass miles to redeem on *A airlines. However the miles aren't transferred to another program to do so. It would be a CO award on their rules and at the mileage cost level they set.

I expect it will be a while before CO joins *A. Thus if your travel is within the next 1-2 years you may need to transfer from Amex to a different program (one that is already in *A).

Are you sure this is what you have done? There is a difference between transferring points to another program and using points on another airline.

When you transfer points the points would be taken out of your CO account and deposited into an Air France Flying Blue account for example. This is not possible in Star Alliance and I think this is also not possible in Skyteam.

I think what you are talking about is that you used your CO points on AF for example. No points have been transfered to another account in this case. You are just using them for another airline but CO.

This is also how it works in Star Alliance. You can not transfer points to another *A program but will be able to use your CO points for a LH flight. How many points you need will be determined by the CO award chart so don't look it up at Miles & More.

Again, the policy in Star Alliance is the same. You will be able to use your CO points for a LX ticket. Will they keep the very low threshold of 100k points for F? I don't know but it would surprise me.

Regarding Amex: It is not that Amex doesn't allow transfers to Star Alliance. In many countries this is happening. It is only that Amex USA doesn't allow transfer to UA. So if CO joins Star Alliance the CO/Amex relationship shouldn't be effected by it.

I can tell its been a while since you've done this since you mentioned you used AF F class. These days no North American Skyteam carrier can get you an award ticket on AF in F class. (nor KE F class for that matter, which is the only other Skyteam airline with international F.)

You didn't transfer miles between skyteam programs. What happened is you called your Skyteam airline's frequent flyer programs and they issued a ticket for you on the other Skyteam airline's flights. Your ticket was still issued on your host airline's ticket stock.

Each Skyteam airline just as each Star Alliance Airline has their own mileage requirements for trips booked from point A to point B. It might cost 100,000 miles on one member for a trip in C from JFK-TLV while it might be 130,000 on another. Each is left to make their own rules and mileage price points.

When/If CO actually joins *A you will be able to get a ticket on ANY *A carrier at CO's mileage price point if the partner has availability when you want to travel. If the switchover actually happens it will probably be later in 2009 or 2010 because of the hoops to jump through before the switch occurs. If you're trip is anytime soon then you'll be on a Skyteam ticket if you're using CO miles for it. That allows you to utilize a combination of CO, DL, NW, KL, AF, OK, and AZ. (no SU Moscow-TLV flights, makes an award tough to use to TLV)

It took place in June, 2004 and miles were transferred from my Delta account with fill-up transfer to said account from Amex. We still have the pajamas which were issued as part of the amenities kit. If my memory still serves, the cognac served was aged Otard. I now maintain very few miles in my DL account (burned the majority) preferring to transfer from Amex or Marriott as needed.

Keeping your miles in Amex until needed is smart since it allows you the flexibilty to use several programs depending on who has availability for the flights you want.

Sadly getting international F awards from US based skyteam airlines is mostly over now, at least with Skyteam partners (AF & KE are the only ones with F). The few F options that still exist with CO, DL, or NW miles are on non-skyteam airline partners of each respective airline. I think it was early last year when AF stopped accepting F awards with DL miles. There were some reports of people who were already ticketed and AF stuck them in business class when they went to check in.

You might have to shop around a bit with AMEX partners to find your award before transferring the points. Awards to TLV are known to be difficult to come by. Depending on when you want to go, it may come down to taking whatever you can find rather than getting to choose the airline with the best business class seat on the route.

While the rate isn't as good with your Marriott points, at you can transfer both Marriott and Amex into NH and SQ if you want *A.

Are you talking about tranferring Amex MR points to CO, or MR points to the issuing *A carrier? If the former, then its been answered in several other posts before. If you're talking about finding the best carrier to transfer the MR points into, that's another issue.