This is something which has been on my mind. I'm about 4000 miles away from my goal of a trip to Australia and/or New Zealand. That's about 2-3 months of credit card activity. My plan was to meet my goal and then get an award ticket on one of the Star Alliance airlines (in this case Air New Zealand). My line of reasoning is that once ticketed (on a partner airline) even if United goes under the partner airline would still honor the ticket. I'm going to closely watch the situation and if it looks like I won't make it I'll cash in for a trip to Europe (on Lufthansa). Does this argument sound valid? Or should I expect that any mileage awards (already ticketed on partner airlines) would be invalidated once United collapses?

John in San Diego