Story and comments on various y2k problems from Accounting WEB

UK: Problems Reported with Sage Accounting Software

Accounting software company Sage has clarified the year-2000 compatibility of its latest Instant Accounting and Line 50 programs in response to complaints from AccountingWEB members that they defaulted to 2099 when "99" was entered into date fields. Company spokesworman Suzy Goulding sent a comment to AccountingWEB explaining that date display and date entry issues had been addressed in the latest editions of both products. Her advice to users was: "Please enter a four-digit year date, and the year 1999 will be accepted by the software." She added that Sage continually endeavours to cater for its customers and considers their comments when deciding the functionality of new products. Since the New Year, AccountingWEB's Y2K problem page has been one of the busiest on the site. It was kicked off by LawZone editor Joe Reevy, who found that an older version of Sage Instant Accounting printed dates entered as "99" as 19100. Once the collective sigh of relief subsided over the lack of cataclysmic crashes, community members began to report other low-level glitches in their software. J M Swallow, for example found his PTP Returns software printed "00" dates as 1900. The PTP support team advised a temporary fix by chaning the Windows Control Panel short date format (sht.date) to dd/mm/yyyy rather than yy. This worked, Swallow reported, but sadly "shagged" his TAS Books accounting software, which demanded dd/mm/yy formats. Another correspondent noted that, like older versions of Sage Instant Accounting, the ICAEW's Exam Results page was not immune to the Millennium bug. Visitors are advised that the year is now "100". Contributions to the page have ranged from despairing and downright cynical to more optimistic assessments. Nigel Harris came up with a completely new take on the problem. First thing on Tuesday 4 January, he went to open the post, only to discover that the firm's 10-year date stamp only went up to 1999. "I'm getting a new rubber stamp out of the IT dept's budget," he vowed. http://www.accountingweb.co.uk/cgi-bin/item.cgi?id=10560&d=101

Kevin Salter , ELS and Y2K A return submitted via ELS on 05/01/2000 was apparently accepted on 07/01/1900. Problem appears to arise in that our tax software uses 4 digit year dates and the TEM uses 2!!!

john Morris , US Postal service gets round Y2K I see that my Lotus spreadsheet thinks today is the 11/1/100. Meanwhile, a letter recently received from the US was date stamped 33 December 1999. That must make today the 43 December 1999!

Bernie Harper , Sage Accounting V4 Whilst most of us have upgraded, one client had problems with her V4. On screen she entered the dates for retrospective entries in 1999 with 4 digits and they were correct, reporting was different they constantly showed the next millenium, her date ranging on reports read... 01123999 to 31123999. Can I party again and again tomorrow!!! Suzy Goulding (Sage) , Sage Instant and Line 50 Y2K compliance The latest releases of Instant Accounting and Line 50 are fully Year 2000 compliant. All the issues regarding "date entry" and "date display" have been addressed within these versions. Please enter a four digit year date, and the year 1999 will be accepted by the software. Sage continually endeavour to meet the business needs of all our customers. Comments received from customers are considered when deciding the functionality of new products.

Matthew Riley , More on 2099 Further to Chris Scott's comments, the computer that is running Instant Accounting is set to a 4 digit year ... so his assumption is false. The problem lies solely with Sage. I see that some have used these problems to have a general dig at Sage -- this was not the intention of my comment. No program, however well designed, is perfect & they all have their idiosyncrasies. For the most part we've found Sage packages to be among the best on the market and better priced as well!

JM swallow , win98 date conflict drama We use various products including PTP tax return software and TAS books. Yesterday I found that PTP Returns print with date ab/cd/1900 ! Their support team said the temporary fix is to change in Control Panel sht.date to dd/mm/yyyy rather than yy. BUT this shags TAS which demands dd/mm/yy format dates only. So I can only have the dates right in PTP by temporarily resetting date formats before printing. Even more bizarrly on-screen the dates in PTP are fine !! Still at least my computer still wo......

Chris Scott , Default date of 2099 PC's with a short date format with only 2 characters in the year positions will, when running certain applications, pad out a four character year with the current century and read, say, 2099. This I have found is the case running the report writer IQ and is attributable entirely to PC set-up. I wonder if this could be relevant to the experiences of the SAGE users whose comments appear in this column?

Mark D. Smith , Instant98 Recurring payment Bug Having used instant98 since march98 with little problem and being under the impression it was y2k (says it on the box), I have a problem. Recurring payments 3 due 1/1/2000 entered ok on (3/1/2000) then on 4/1/2000 asked again to enter even though next not due until 10/1/2000. Seems if i advance date passed and post its ok. I have not heard anything from Sage re this. Did i miss a patch?

Paul Copley , Not accounting software, but... ...www.footballstockex.com, the maddly addictive fantasy football stock exchange (just try it, you'll see!), had the same problem. 1999+1 = 19100. :-) Apparently the French Weather Centre computers had the same glitch!

Laurence Bagley , Sage Line 50 and Y2K Sage Line 50 version 5 appears to have the same problem with 99 input dates as reported here for Instant Accounting i.e. if you input 99 it defaults to 2099! It does at least issue a warning to tell you the date is outside of your financial year!

Matthew Riley , The Millennium Bug Instant Accounting 2000, whilst millennium compliant, has an annoying habit of defaulting to "2099" when entering the shorthand of "99" for the year part of a date. This will undoubtedly affect many people, and though not a bug as such is a bit silly. If it has to default to anything why not 1999? Defaulting to 2099 is as valid as 2099, 2199 or even 2999! On a related subject Compuserve 3.0.4 UK is blithely now giving dates of e-mails sent and received as the year 100 !!

JM Swallow , Sage (non)Instant Accounts Also if you go to run a Report where data criteria are involved -> select a date on the scroll with a 30 or 31 month end then scroll the months until you get to February 31st 1999 (!!) Seriously Sage do try hard but they have the usual of problem of when you get tooooooo big. There are several better packages in the market place but no one has ever heard of them so they don't get the use they deserve

Joe Reevy , Instant Accounting The one we were using was bought about 15 months ago (ie in 1998). it doesn't seem to me to demand a lot of thought to realise that this problem would happen when theer were only 3 years (max) between 97 and 00! The people I was helping will be changing systems at their year end...but not to SAGE! PS The print comes out 3/1/100 BTW.

Link to site:

http://www.newsnow.co.uk/cgi/NGoto/1012261?-89

-- Carl Jenkins (Somewherepress@aol.com), January 18, 2000