For what it's worth, I thought I would pass on a couple of possible glitches that I have encountered. The first had to do with my medical insurance. Approx. 1 month ago I received a letter from my former employer telling me that their computer system would not be Y2K compliant and that in light of that they were going to a different system. They explained how the statements would be different, etc. About 2 weeks ago, I got a call from a medical provider stating that my claim had been denied. I called the insurance represenative who, with a certain tone of frustration in her voice, said it was a glitch and she would take care of it. As far as I know, it has been taken care of because I have had no further problems with my medical provider. The second incident was with my financial institution. I was wanting to transfer funds from one account to another. I had earlier electronically transferred some funds from a savings to a checking and when I wanted to transfer those to another checking account via the phone and a live clerk, I was told that the transfer was not performed and that they were having problems with their new software and would be unable to perform that transaction that day. I had not called them back, so I don't know if the problem has been solved.

These were small problems and it appears that in my case, they were able to work around it. I had to wonder though about the status of the financial institute since they are supposed to be ready for anything. I thought about what would happen if it had been hundreds of people trying to conduct a transaction, even a simple one, and how frustrating this would be to them.

As a side note to the medical problem. The Doctor that I have been seeing said she is contemplating filing for bankruptcy. She cannot get payment from the insurance companies. This may or may not be a result of a Y2K type of problems, but I thought it unusual and a bit disconcerting that a physician would possibly have to file bankruptcy because she can't pay her bills because the insurance companies aren't paying her.

-- B.Clark (mrmomx6@aol.com), October 19, 1999

Answers

From: Y2K, ` la Carte by Dancr (pic), near Monterey, California

My health insurance company owes me over $10,000.00, and I'm sure they're dragging their feet, hoping to stall me to the end of the year. They're already well beyond the 30 days in which they're required to pay, and if they delay me one more time, I'm afraid I'm going to have to hire a lawyer (Oh, yuck!)

-- Dancr (addy.available@my.webpage), October 19, 1999.

Dancr, before you hire a lawyer, try going through the Insurance Commissioner in Sacramento, they may be able to help you.

-- bardou (bardou@baloney.com), October 19, 1999.

B. Clark: It might be best to get some documentation stating the everything HAS been taken care of. Many years ago someone assured me "it" was taken care of, but I spent 4 hours in the Sutter County jail (N. Cal.) on an FTA for a jaywalking ticket. Yes, now I can look back and laugh, but then the situation was not laughable, nor was it anywhere near as important as your insurance. Just my .02.

-- J Henry Lyons (shotgun12@att.net), October 19, 1999.

During 1999 I have recieved 3 separate refund checks from my state tax department. All were small, none were explained. I cashed them, what the heck.

-- Lars (lars@indy.net), October 19, 1999.

Get all this stuff in writing as soon as you can....I would not trust "telephone conversations" if the primary records have been scramble in either the primary or (new) secondary computers.

-- Robert A. Cook, PE (Marietta, GA) (cook.r@csaatl.com), October 19, 1999.