I just found out that United does not roll-over qualifying miles from one year to the next. I find this unbelievable. Every other airline will roll over miles above the award level from one year to the next, and United always did before. They have now stopped. I lost over 20,000 miles that I thought would roll over to 2014.
Have others had this experience? Is this a known policy at other airlines now? I know Delta rolls over their miles. (Delta has been better than United in service for years, and this just confirmed it for me again!)

Welcome to FT!
UA has never allowed rollover elite miles into the next calendar year.
Take a look at this thread from 2010 ... one of many on this topic.
Also, you're somewhat misinformed: not "every" airline allows rollover miles.
DL does. AA does not. US does not.

If you are indeed concerned about rollovers of elite qualifying miles, I'm sorry you were under this misimpression that this is how frequent flyer programs worked. Moreover, it's a relatively new feature for Delta at all, and pretty meaningless as Medallion Qualifying Dollars do not rollover.


But I'm not sure if you're understanding what's going on here. You don't *lose* the miles earned the year before. If I flew 30,000 miles on United last year, I will qualify for their base elite status (Premier), and start 2014 with no "premier qualifying miles." On Delta, I would be a Silver, and start the year with 5,000 elite qualifying miles in my account. But with both airlines, all 30,000 miles will remain in my account for me to spend until they expire. Delta does not have an expiration date for its miles. For United, miles will expire after 18 months of inactivity (similar to most carriers).

I appreciate the responses. I do realize that I don't lose the miles, but I did seem to recall that United used to roll over the medallion qualifying miles. This just confirms the many ways in which I have been happier with Delta than United - I used to fly a lot more United, but have has such bad service and hassles that I have switched to Delta when I can.

you recall incorrectly
and as noted DL only introduced it a couple years ago - prior to that no airline offered rollover

Are these miles only rolled over on DL when you have achieved a status for the previous year?

It sounds like you would have to meet 2 criteria for this to take effect:
1. achieve a status level
2. have miles between that status level and the next higher level, in which case the remainder of miles would be added at PQM's for the next calendar year.

Is this correct?

Yes, you must be Silver Medallion or higher for miles to roll over

I'm pretty sure this post was a pretty cleverly designed bit of trollbait...

No one would ever troll the UA Medallion program...

Really wrong on multiple fronts.