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Just to put this in perspective, in Germany credit cards are expensive
and not universally accepted. Rather than wear money belts, people use
debit cards tied to their bank accounts. When the first cards with
expiry in '00 were issued, it took a good month before new readers with
updated software were distributed throughout the country.
DanG
Troutman, Defender of Sticks wrote:
>
> > Seriously, is our money going to be safe in our local banks
> > or should it be withdrawn?
>
> Banks are probably one of the more likely groups of companies to be Y2K
> compliant in time. It's the local gas company, hospital and video store
> I'd be more concerned about...
>
> Based on my experience at an EFT company, I'd say that the most likely
> failure will be the proper sequencing of records in the database. The
> suggestion that all existing records will be wiped out because of a year
> change is, frankly, ridiculous. A financial institution would have to
> have code that says, "...and if date < 1974 then delete all fields in
> all data files." As *if*. The transactions will be dutifully recorded
> with the incorrect date, but reports against the database may break
> (meaning statements would be delayed), and a correct accounting of the
> new transactions may take a while...
>
> ...but it'll happen. Rest assured that if you suck a whole bunch of
> money from an ATM on 1/1/2000, they'll eventually properly clear the
> transactions and debit your account, *even if* the ATM transactions are
> being routed through the company I used to work for. ;-)
>
> The other probable occurrence I'd expect would be a lot of denied
> transactions at ATM and POS machines, and possibly denials within your
> local branch if you go there to deposit a check. I'd have some extra
> cash on hand before the end of 1999, just in case it takes them a month
> to sort things out.
>
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