[Dornkirk]

I'm wondering if you know whether there's any program that allows earning miles to spend on any airline?

I'm going to be doing a trip in two months that will take me from the Mid-West to SE Asia and then I'll hop a few places in SE Asia before coming back to the states - I currently don't have any frequent flyer program as I hardly ever fly (a few times a year) - but I'd hate for this trip to go wasted - plus I may be traveling quite a bit next year.

[JimmyL]

I don't think there are any airline points that work across _all_ airlines - if for no other reason than this removes the loyalty incentive that makes FF programs attractive to the host airlines. Generally, the programs that let you use your points anywhere will be run by a third-party, often your credit-card provider.

As the article says, get every account you might fly on, but keep your focus on one airline/alliance. If you need to move your points around between airlines, there are services like points.com that let you do that for a fee.

[prawn]

Last time I undertook a major trip (37 flights through 20ish countries), there were two main alliances - Star and OneWorld, from memory. If you stuck to airlines from one of those, your points would be combined.

I don't fly all that regularly (maybe just above average) so things might've changed since then.

[gaius]

Now there is a third - SkyTeam. Plus there is Virgin Atlantic who aren't a member of any alliance but have one-off deals with individual airlines.

[Keyframe]

As prawn suggested, and I know for a fact, Star Alliance has a program. So, if you stick with airlines within SA and get into their program you'll be fine.