I spoke to a distant relative working for an autoparts manufacturer. Conversation went like this:

Me: Has your company remediated your computers/software for Y2K?

He: Yes. The EDP department said we are Y2K-Compliant.

Me: So you now see 4 digits for the year part of the date on your screens?

He: Yes. 4 digits. It works.

Me (a bit more interested): Really? That's amazing. How about your reports? Do all your reports work fine?

He: We had some problems. In a payables report, payables in Jan 2000 precede payables in Dec 99. This information is sent to another system which prints the cheques. This has caused a lot of confusion in our section. So we don't use the system now. We manually verify the outstandings and then make the payments. This takes a lot of time. Several payments are pending. Some big vendors are shouting at us. Small vendors are literally begging us to release cheques. Some of them admitted they can't even pay their electricity bills. The situation is pathetic. Besides, we now have to be doubly careful before releasing cheques lest the management should think we pre-paid the vendors using these computer problems as a cover. We really don't know how it is going to work out eventually.

(My comments: Look at how this well-meaning person initially parrot-repeated the EDP department's claim of Y2K-compliance and later described a very pathetic payables situation. He couldn't understand that the two were connected - Y2K Disconnect at all levels of abstraction.)

Me: I see. Are you personally prepared for Y2K problems?

He: I hear that India is not very computerized. So we don't have to worry. I guess it is the US that will be most affected. Isn't so?

(My comments: This is reverse-Koskinenisation in action. Universal Y2K psychology: "My company/country/industry is OK. Others aren't.")

Me: (at a loss for words...)

-- Parthasarathy Srinivasan, India (psrinivasan99@yahoo.com), December 19, 1999

Answers

Wow, I'm at a loss for words too... the US gov says "But look at all the money WE spent" as a reason for why we will fair this storm well, and instead points to other nations as having a greater risk (that was the y2k story on the news Sat night; I don't believe that though).

I think you make an eye-opening remark by pointing out that it may be the same game everywhere. That is heartbreaking to imagine.

-- Hokie (nn@va.com), December 19, 1999.

Thanks for your post, Parthasarathy! (Do you have a nick-name, or may I call you "Par"??)I believe you are describing a universal situation in your post...unfortunately. What are your plans for the 31st? Are you going to be on-line as long as possible? I certainly hope you will pass along what news you have to the rest of us on this forum; assuming that the web/net will be "up". Thanks again!

-- jeanne (jeanne@hurry.now), December 19, 1999.

Yes, thanks for posting.Always interesting to hear the first person account from outside the U.S. Odd, isn't it, how the "family of man" shares such unversal traits? Good luck to you, Parthasarathy.

-- johno (jobriy2k@yahoo.com), December 19, 1999.

The word compliant is significantly linked to the word bandaid!

-- Susan Barrett (sue59@bellsouth.net), December 19, 1999.

The word think is now being used interchangibly with the word hope.

-- Earl (shuholm@tstar.net), December 19, 1999.

Damn...they invented the zero, and now it comes back in three's to haunt them.

Makes you wish not everybody ending up using the European date system.....then again, at least that makes everybody equally affected, so perhaps it is better in the long run.

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

Jeanne,

>What are your plans for the 31st?

Prayer. Vigilance. Bugging out backup plan.

>Are you going to be on-line as long as possible? I certainly hope you will pass along what news you have to the rest of us on this forum; assuming that the web/net will be "up".

Sure. I will report what I see here.

Thanks.

-- Parthasarathy Srinivasan, India (psrinivasan99@yahoo.com), December 20, 1999.