We are flying Air New Zealand and want to credit the miles to either Ual or Usair. We really don't fly either airline much. Any advantage of one over the other?

One factor in your decision making is which airline are you likely to use your miles on - USAirways still has concentration in Eastern US (I know, they do west coast and international as well) while UAL has more fligfhts Chicago and west. Also, look on their individual websites and see who their partners are - that may make a difference as well.

The Wall Street Journal had an article on March 6 which ranked airlines' frequent flyer programs in relationship to how much availability each of them has when you're ready to cash in your miles for an award ticket. United and American Air came out best, Continental and Northwest ranked in the middle, and USAir ranked among the worst two, Delta being the worst. The differences between airlines as to how much availibility they had was dramatic--some were stingey with available seats, some were not. Based on this ranking, I would venture that you'd be wisest to put your miles in United rather than USAir, UNLESS you live in an area that is clearly better served by USAir routes. That is, as was mentioned, USAir's routes are more concentrated in the U.S. East whereas United's are more in the Midwest and West.

As the others said, I'd pick based on which airline best serves your home market and travel pattern. Since you mentioned that you don't travel on either carrier much, do note that both have recently changed their mileage expiration policies--if there's no account activity for 18 months, the miles will expire. I don't know what US Airways offers, but for Mileage Plus, you can sign up for things like the Safeway/Dominick's/etc. grocery program or the dining program, which will generate account activity without flying, thus extending the expiration date.

Thank you for your replies. I, too, read the same article which answered my question. It would seem that United would be the best choice. We actually flew a short flight on USAir last week through Charlotte and were not all at all pleased with all of the hassle with the computer mix-up. However, we live in FL and United does not have a huge presence here...so I still am not sure.