The Major Frequent Flyer Program Alliances and Their Partners

All major airlines have some sort of loyalty, or frequent flyer program where you can earn various levels of status and privileges based on how many miles you accumulate. In addition. Most of them have partner airlines with whom you can also earn mileage. The miles you earn, serve 2 purposes: one, they can be used for earning free reward tickets, and two, you accumulate 'Elite Miles' towards achieving Elite Status, which allows you varying levels of perks depending on which level you attain. Generally, there are 3 levels of Elite Status; silver, gold and platinum, on most. When you have Elite Status within your own airline's frequent flyer program, their partners will also acknowledge your status so your perks and benefits are portable.

In deciding which frequent flyer program to join, you should start by considering which airline best serves the areas you tend to travel to and from, and also, who their partners are. Below is a list of 3 major frequent flyer program alliances, and their partner airlines:


SKYTEAM

• Aeroflot
• Aeromexico
• Air Europa
• Air France
• Alitalia
• China Southern
• Continental (only until October 24, 2009)
• Copa Airlines
• Czech Airlines
• Delta
• Kenya Airways
• KLM
• Korean Air
• Northwest

STAR ALLIANCE

• Air Canada
• Air China
• Air New Zealand
• ANA
• Asiana Airlines
• Austrian
• BMI
• Continental (starting October 24, 2009)
• Egyptair
• LOT Polish Airlines
• Lufthansa
• Scandinavian Airlines
• Shanghai Airlines
• South African Airways
• Spanair
• SWISS
• TAP Portugal
• THAI
• Turkish Airlines
• United
• US Airways

ONE WORLD ALLIANCE

• American Airlines
• British Airways
• Cathay Pacific
• Finnair
• Iberia
• Japan Airlines
• LAN
• Malev
• Qantas
• Royal Jordanian

What to do With Your 25k Miles: Getting the Most for your AirMiles

By now, hopefully you have opened your Chase account and are happily waiting for your easy 25K miles to be deposited into your Continental OnePass account. Now comes the fun part-- planning where to go with your reward ticket. What can you do with your 25,000 miles you wonder? Well, 25k is the minimum number of miles needed for a reward ticket for travel within the US and to Canada. We like to get more mileage for our airmiles so we think a free ticket to Alaska, British Columbia, California and Washington State (or wherever happens to be furthest from where you are) make the most sense, or just to any destination for which tickets tend to be pricier. For instance, Jackson Hole, Wyoming is not as far as Seattle, Washington for us (we are in New York City) but tickets are usually quite a bit pricier, so that would be a great place to use a reward ticket for. We wouldn't be likely to use a reward ticket for a popular route like Miami because that would really only be a savings of about $160. But using it to go to Vancouver, makes that reward ticket worth over $500 to us!

If you're willing to wait until you get to 35k miles, then you'll have enough for destinations in Hawaii, Mexico and the Caribbean. In the past year alone, we have used free reward tickets to go to Hawaii at Christmas (published fares were over $1100), Provence for lavender season (published fares were over $1600), Mexico, St. Louis, and to island hop from Kauai to the Big Islands; in other words, we used 135K miles for over $3500 worth of airplane tickets! Now that's getting the most for your airmiles.

Get a Free Continental Reward Ticket Fast!

Want a free reward ticket right away? Now's your chance. When folks hear that many of our great trips are done with free frequent flyer reward tickets, they often get excited and want to know our "secret" for getting them. However, as soon as we start listing all the many things we do to amass miles, they generally start to zone out. We think an hour of our time per week is a tiny investment for the pay-off, and we actually think it's fun to come up with new and creative ways to earn more miles but we understand that you might need to see (at least) one quick pay-off in order to get excited.

So here it is: a way to earn your first free ticket, with one simple action. Well, maybe 6 actions, but they're all related. For the past 2 years, Continental OnePass has offered between 20,000 and 25,000 miles for opening a Chase checking account. The extraordinary offer is usually valid for a 2 month period but they've re-issued the offer for the 2nd time this year, and this time it's being extended to the end of the year!

All you have to do is open a new Chase checking account, with a new $100 deposit ("new", meaning you can't withdraw the money from an existing Chase account to open the new one). That's the main step; the other 5 requirements are simple: just request the Chase OnePass Preferred Debit card ($40-$60 annual fee) and make 6 purchases with it within 60 days of opening the account. You will receive 10,000 miles for opening the account and 15,000 for making the 6 purchases within 60 days. For those who don't want to pay the annual fee for the preferred debit card you can skip that part and just get 10,000 miles for opening the account only. Personally, we think the fee is worth it because with the Preferred card, you also get 1 mile for every dollar charged to the card. We use it to pay as many bills as we can, and therefore get miles for our utility bills, insurance, groceries, etc.

See our primer on Air Miles to learn more about the different programs but for now, get on down to Chase and start planning your first free trip!

Click here to get the voucher you need to print and bring with you to open the account, and also for full details on the terms of the offer.

Airmiles, Do You Have What It Takes?

Although it is easy to do, collecting airmiles takes some effort. It adds a few extra steps to the travel planning process and those extra steps will require a little bit of your time. A little extra time translates into a lot of inconvenience... if you have not found the right motivation. To this end, picture yourself seeing Paris or London for the first time, walking over a lava field on the Big Island in Hawaii, visiting the Taj Mahal, strolling down the Vegas strip, or wherever it is that you would like to be that seems unattainable at the moment; and keep that vision in mind. This is what it is all about for us as well. We keep our eyes on the prizes. As a result, we have come to view those extra steps as the tools that help us to achieve our travel goals. They are no longer inconveniences, but opportunities that we are excited to discover and use to our advantage whenever possible.

Collecting airmiles also requires a bit of patience. Airmiles are not something you can amass in an instant nor are they a discount program that allows you to save on a trip that you are planning right now. You collect airmiles so that 6 months from now, you can take a trip or several trips and ideally many more!

If you can find your motivation (i.e. picture yourself traveling), roll-up your sleeves and put in a little extra effort, and recognize that it will take a little time, we promise you that you will see great results. We have taken countless trips on airmiles and are eagerly planning where to go next with our stockpiles... and, of course, how to earn more miles!

Which airmiles and rewards programs should I join?

It should come as no surprise that not all airmiles programs are created equally. What are the differences? And which ones should you join? These are important questions. We can't answer them all in one post, but we can help get you on the right path.

How you collect points in these programs varies. Most programs award you miles based on how many miles you pay for and fly, and they also provide numerous ways to earn additional miles through non-flight-related activity. A handful of programs reward you with points for each segment that you fly, e.g. a non-stop flight is 1 point, but a flight with 1 layover is 2 segments and thus 2 points. Some programs even provide both types of rewards system. We lean toward programs that offer miles rather than points.

Every major airline has a travel reward program. We believe that it is a good idea to belong to several of them. At the moment, we recommend Continental OnePass, Northwest WorldPerks, and Delta Skymiles, because these programs provide the best opportunities to both earn and redeem miles. Many other programs out there tease you with great opportunities to earn miles, but then make it very difficult to find available seats when you try to redeem those miles. The three programs that we recommend don't always provide you with the perfect seats on the perfect dates, but they do so more often than other programs. We also really like that they are a part of the SkyTeam alliance and have reciprocity with each other (as well as other airlines) which gives us more options. They also offer very competitive prices for their airfares which makes earning miles on paid flights a bit easier on our wallets, which is a farily important part of our strategy in collecting miles.

There are some major changes on the horizon however. In December of 2009, Northwest WorldPerks will collapse into Delta Skymiles. Also, in October of 2009, Continental OnePass will no longer be affiliated with the SkyTeam program. This, of course, means that we may need to change our strategies for collecting airmiles... more about that in a future post.

So, when should you join these reward programs? Often, the programs will give you additional miles when you sign-up. Ordinarily, you may want to monitor for a while to see when they have one of these promotions as it can sometimes net you a great deal of bonus miles. Of course, the longer you sit out, the longer you are NOT accumulating airmiles. We recommend that you just jump in and get that airmile wheel running as soon as possible, esp. since there are changes to these programs on the horizon. It is in your interest to collect as many airmiles as possible, before some of these opportunities go away for good!

Delta SkyMiles

Delta SkyMiles is the rewards program for Delta airlines, and is a part of the SkyTeam Alliance which currently has 14 member airlines. We find that Delta offers some of the most competitive airfares among the SkyTeam Alliance members and as a result is a great airline in which to earn airmiles for actual flight miles flown (as opposed to earning airmiles for non-flight related activities).

Due to the Delta and Northwest merger, the Delta SkyMiles program will become the rewards program for both Delta and Northwest in December of 2009, and the Northwest WorldPerks program will no longer exist at this time.

Northwest WorldPerks

Northwest WorldPerks is the rewards program for Northwest airlines, and is a part of the SkyTeam Alliance which currently has 14 member airlines. We find that Northwest WorldPerks offers some of the best opportunities for earning miles through non-flight related activities. The WorldPerks Mall has the widest selection of online partner stores and is often the first place we check when we want to collect airmiles when making an online purchase. Northwest WorldPerks also has some of the best reward flight options when you want to redeem your airmiles for international travel.

Unfortunately, this program will be coming to an end in December of 2009. Northwest and Delta have merged and the end result is that there will be that only the Delta SkyMiles program will survive. However, all of the airmiles that you earn in Northwest WorldPerks can be transferred to Delta SkyMiles, so it is in your interest to take advantage of this and collect as many miles as you can in Northwest WorldPerks before December!

Continental OnePass

Continental OnePass is where we currently aim to collect the most airmiles. It is the rewards program for Continental airlines, and a part of the SkyTeam Alliance which currently has 14 member airlines. We find that Continental OnePass offers the most reward flight options when you want to redeem your airmiles. At the moment, it also offers some of the best incentives for earning airmiles. Unfortunately, Continental will be leaving the SkyTeam Alliance in October 2009, but we still think it is the best value at the moment.

Why are we so excited about Airmiles?

We think that airmiles are the greatest invention since the airplane itself! Why? Because airmiles are essentially what enable us to take amazing trips to distant places while paying nothing or only a nominal fee for airfare. We have used airmiles to travel to Europe, Central America, and Hawaii, and plan to use them for many more trips to come!

So, what are airmiles? Airmiles (aka frequent flyer miles or rewards programs) are points that all major airlines allow you to collect that can then be redeemed for air travel (or other products and services). A point is generally earned for each mile that you fly and/or each dollar that you spend. Why is this such a great thing? Because it is actually not that difficult to collect a significant number of airmiles -- through strategic travel choices, wise credit card use, and being savvy about how you make everyday purchases and payments. For example, purchasing a gift on a store's website rather than in person will often net you airmiles, and often several airmiles for each dollar spent, plus a dollar for each mile on your credit card. To sweeten the deal, sometimes stores even give you a slight discount for purchasing an item online and even throw in free shipping!

If you are strategic about what you do with the airmiles once that you have them, it often works out for some rather exceptional deals -- like visiting Provence or Hawaii during peak seasons when ticket prices are the most expensive, or making trips to locations that are always expensive, for example, Asia, the South Pacific, and Australia. This is why we are excited about airmiles! They essentially enable us to do more of the thing that we love most and to visit amazing places that would ordinarily be out of our financial reach.

So, how do you get started, what rewards programs are best, and how do you get started?! More to come in upcoming posts...