Korea's Fair Trade Commission approved the final plan to fold Asiana Airlines' mileage program into Korean Air's SkyPass on September 15, clearing the last real hurdle before the two carriers become one legal entity on December 17. If you're sitting on Asiana miles, or you've been stockpiling Korean Air SkyPass through a transferable-points card, here's what actually changes — and the one detail in the plan that isn't getting nearly enough attention.

What the regulator actually approved

This isn't the merger itself — that closed back in 2024. This is Korea's Fair Trade Commission signing off on the specific mechanics of how Asiana's mileage program gets absorbed into Korean Air's SkyPass, a plan Korean Air had been revising and resubmitting for more than a year under regulatory pressure. The approval came with strings attached: Korean Air has to maintain award-seat availability at or above pre-merger levels, guarantee long-haul redemption inventory on Americas, Europe, and Oceania routes for a full decade, and submit to an FTC oversight committee that will actually track whether it's keeping those promises. That last part matters — airline loyalty program mergers have a long, ugly history of regulators approving a plan on paper and then nobody checking whether the airline actually follows it.

Your Asiana miles aren't disappearing on December 17

The headline fear with any airline merger is that your balance gets zeroed out or force-converted at a lousy rate the day the ink dries. That's not what's happening here. Existing Asiana miles roll over and stay usable under Asiana's original redemption chart for a full 10 years from the December 17 merger date. You're not required to convert anything immediately — you can keep booking under Asiana's rules, or convert to SkyPass whenever it suits you. Elite status carries over automatically too: Asiana's top tiers get matched to the equivalent Korean Air tier, and Korean Air is rolling out a new "Morning Calm Select" tier specifically to preserve SkyTeam Elite Plus benefits for members who'd otherwise fall through the cracks.

The catch: not all miles convert equally

Here's the detail that actually matters if you're deciding whether to keep earning Asiana miles or switch your transferable points to Korean Air directly. Miles you earned by actually flying Asiana convert to SkyPass at a clean 1:1 ratio. But miles earned through partners — co-branded credit cards, retail and shopping partners, anything that wasn't a flight — convert at 1:0.82. That's an 18% devaluation, dressed up in regulatory approval language as "accounting for differing consumer investment levels in partnership programs." If most of your Asiana balance came from a card's everyday spending rather than actual flights, that's real value walking out the door, and no amount of "10 years to use it" changes the math on what you're left holding.

Why this matters if you've never flown Asiana

Korean Air SkyPass is a live transfer partner for Amex Membership Rewards, Citi ThankYou Points, and Marriott Bonvoy — so this isn't just an Asiana-loyalist problem. With the merger finalizing December 17 and redemption access expanding to Korean Air's full network (including U.S.-exclusive routes Asiana never flew, like Washington Dulles, Las Vegas, and Atlanta), SkyPass just got meaningfully more useful as a transfer-partner destination. The practical takeaway: if you're weighing a points transfer to either program before year-end, transfer straight to Korean Air SkyPass rather than routing through Asiana — you'll skip the 0.82 conversion entirely, since that penalty only applies to miles that started life in Asiana's program.

Confirmed directly on Korean Air's own newsroom, which published the approved plan's full terms on September 15, 2026.