Where to credit miles for Skyteam (Garuda and China Airlines) flights?

[Babesofy]

When you fly with Garuda and China airlines, where do you choose to credit your miles to successfully redeem flights?

I see myself flying a fair bit with Garuda and China Airlines over the next few years. I dont care about earning status but I do care about how easy it will be to redeem points for flights.

Within Skyteam, China Airlines seem to be the front runner so far as it has no points expiry and allows family points pooling/transfer. However a search on this forum some have mentioned they only release 1 J seat at a time and I dont know what their partner availability is like.

I have checked wheretocredit, but that only answers half of the story (how much miles is earned). It doesn't address what its like redeeming on those programs.

I am based in Sydney if that makes a difference.

 

[tassie6]

I would probably credit to Flying Blue. They have a 24 month expiry but that resets with activity (Iike Qantas/VA)

The other option is Virgin Atlantic, which never expire. Few quirks between them so check before you take my word ha!

 

[Babesofy]

Thanks for the VA rec, I forgotten they joined Skyteam!
So after some digging...
Virgin Atlantic does seem like the best option. - no points expiry, easy family pooling, reasonable award charts. Main issue is online award redemption is for limited carriers and one would need to call to book awards for other partner airlines - there's no australian number so would need to be an overseas call.
Flying Blue I cannot find where it explicitly allows Qantas flights to extend miles expiry. There was a points hacks article that specifically noted Qantas is excluded from the mileage extension list.
China Airline has a 3yr points expiry, not no expiry as I previously thought.

 

[jase05]

Thanks for the VA rec, I forgotten they joined Skyteam!
So after some digging...
Virgin Atlantic does seem like the best option. - no points expiry, easy family pooling, reasonable award charts. Main issue is online award redemption is for limited carriers and one would need to call to book awards for other partner airlines - there's no australian number so would need to be an overseas call.
Flying Blue I cannot find where it explicitly allows Qantas flights to extend miles expiry. There was a points hacks article that specifically noted Qantas is excluded from the mileage extension list.
China Airline has a 3yr points expiry, not no expiry as I previously thought.

I use VS Flying club as it allows me to earn on SkyTeam plus several others that we use such as SQ and VA so I can credit domestic VA flights to them to help keep SkyTeam elite status.
The program does have its faults but I’ve found redemptions not too bad for what we need plus they often have points sales to top up