I am travelling to Thailand from Boston on United-ANA in January? Should I sign up for United FF program or ANA's? We go to Asia almost every year but we live in Boston. We have miles up the wazoo on American as it is. TIA!

What other flying do you do besides the almost-annual Asia trip? Are you in the US Airways program?

We have some miles on Continental and JetBlue and Capitalone. Besides Asia (mostly Japan and India) we fly to Mexico, California, and Spain.

Continental is joining the Star Alliance later this month. Although I don't think it has published mileage accrual for Star Alliance partners yet, I'd think you could accrue miles there for a trip in January.

Are you traveling on a discounted economy ticket? If so, ANA flights earn 70% or 50% of miles flown; that will be the same whether you credit to ANA, United or US Airways (probably Continental as well, but no details yet).

If you already have some miles with Continental, I would just accrue with them. As noted, they haven't published an earnings chart for partners, but I would think they will have earnings rates very similar to UA and ANA.

Generally, you want flight credit to go to the FF program for the airline that you fly the most. You won't be flying ANA to Mexico, California, or Spain.

Whether to accrue miles with Continental would depend on how many you have (unless it was the airlines that you use the most).

If you are flying to California (LAX? SFO?) a lot then you might want to consider the number of nonstops available on different partners. United has a couple of nonstops a day, but none on Continental, I think. But if you prefer to use jetBlue for those trips then you won't be earning any Star Alliance miles.

What airline(s) are you using for the Thailand trip?

How many miles do you fly each year domestic? international?

BOS-ORD-NRT-BKK would be a 10,000 mile trip each way. If the trip earns 100% EQMs, then that gets you within 5,000 miles of Premier status and Economy Plus seating if you had the miles (EQMs) deposited.

We don't fly anywhere enough to be "elite" or anything. Our credit card was linked to our AA account, so usually we fly AA, but after getting a free ticket to Thailand with literally no hassle on Capitalone, we are thinking to rack up CO points and then join the FF program of every airline we fly (we already have Continental miles from the Costa Rica trip plus Northwest from India).

Annoyingly, because of a stupid QantasVacations travel agent (QV are NOT affiliated with Qantas btw) we didn't get ANY MILES for our Boston-Australia and back flights. Still smarting over that one. The one time we used a travel agency it ended uo biting us you know where. Never again.

Right now, I have one free ticket on AA (60K miles) and one free ticket on JetBlue. I signed up for a Delta credit card which gives me 25000 miles.

Here is an idea of where we have been going and which airline we fly.
2010: Thailand (ANA - one ticket paid free with Capitalone
2009: Japan (AA), Spain (1 AA FF ticket, Orlando (JB), NT (JB)
2008: Japan ( 2 AA FF ticket), Australia (QA), Seattle (JB),
NY (JB); Costa Rica (CO)
2007: Scandinavia (IC); Mexico (AA); Mexico (1 AA FF ticket)
2006: India (NW); France (AA, 1 FF ticket), Mexico (AA)
2005: Californa (AA); England (BA), Mexico (Aeromexico)
2004: Spain (BA); Peru (AA FF ticket); Toronto (AA);
France(Air France)

If you are flying on a free ticket then you won't earn any miles, so it doesn't matter what FF program you use.

Not true. With Capitalone's program, you buy the ticket using your credit card, pay the airline in full, and then Capitalone gives you a statement credit. So, as far as United/ANA is concerned, it's not a FF ticket, and you can earn miles. How many miles you earn depends on the fare.

Find out what fare class you are on, and how many percentage of miles you can get for each segment on each program. Then decide. If all earn the same, then just put in UA's.

Sorry, if all are equal, then put the miles in CO's Onepass, since you already have some miles there.

With a trip that MIGHT earn 20,000 miles in January, you should consider how you might reach the 25,000 elite qualifying miles tier.

For example, use Continental to go to Mexico instead of AA. Or use UA instead of jetBlue to go to California. Then you will get mileage bonuses and baggage fee exemptions. On UA you would have access to Economy Plus which might be good for a 2011 trip to Asia.

But first, find out how many miles you will earn.

And then figure out how that would help your One Pass account. If you have 11,000 orphan miles in that account then even at a 70% earning rate you'd earn 14,000 miles. Gets the redeemable miles to 25,000 - good for an award.

Probably 70% on United. Here is what the earnings (RDM or EQM) are in Mileage Plus for ANA flights:
100% - Economy Y E
70% - Discount Economy B S K L W M G H
50% - Discount Economy T