Dow Jones News Service

Not All Natl Banks On Track With Y2K Testing: OCC's Hawke

04/13/99

WASHINGTON --Not all national banks are on track with their Y2K testing, and some may not make the June 30 deadline for having computer systems ready for the century date changeover, said Comptroller of the Currency John Hawke Jr. to a House Banking Panel Tuesday. "The testing process has proven to be more complex, time consuming and costly than many banks anticipated," Hawke said in written testimony."

(Snip)

I hope the above testimony (and the rest of the testimony) will be made available on the Web. This is very confusing.

-- FM (vidprof@aol.com), April 13, 1999

Answers

Wonder what it was that the banks "anticipated"? Perhaps that the project would be finished "on time", or with less than "a full year of testing", or that testing would constitute considerably less than "40-60% of the project"? Hope a link becomes available that could put this in context.

-- Brooks (brooksbie@hotmail.com), April 13, 1999.

The ease with which official moutpieces moved from the March 31 deadline to the June 30 deadline is astounding.

-- Vic (Roadrunner@compliant.com), April 13, 1999.

Or mouthpieces.

-- Vic (Roadrunner@compliant.com), April 13, 1999.

March 31 may not have even been the original deadline...

http://www.weissratings.com/y2klies__21099.htm

[snip]

* The Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council (FFIEC), which coordinates various banking regulators, including the Federal Reserve, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation and the Office of Comptroller of the Currency, clarified this requirement in an August 28, 1998 email to bank CEOs, entitled "Year 2000 Questions And Answers," stating: "The FDIC expects each financial institution to meet the following key milestones in the Year 2000 testing process by the date indicated : ...December 31, 1998 -- testing of internal mission-critical systems should be substantially complete."

[snip]

-- Kevin (mixesmusic@worldnet.att.net), April 13, 1999.

Oh, I know, Kevin. My point is how easily they do it. As if no one ever said anything at all about March 31 or Dec. 31 or Sept. 30. Amazing. And, sadly, most Americans don't even stop and think: "Now wait a minute. I thought the deadline was March 31." They're too busy watching the World's Deadliest and Funniest Police Chases and buying into the notion that maybe ground troops aren't such a bad idea after all.

-- Vic (Roadrunner@compliant.com), April 13, 1999.

HTML messed up.

From the page:

By December 31, 1998...

•    Insured financial institutions that perform their computer services in-house should be almost done testing their computer systems to make sure they will correctly recognize dates and handle transactions properly in the Year 2000.

By March 31, 1999...

•    FDIC-insured financial institutions that contract with outside companies for their computer services should be almost done testing with these firms to ensure they will correctly recognize dates and properly handle transactions in the Year 2000.

By June 30, 1999...

•    Insured institutions should finish testing all computer systems and transactions that involve electronic data exchanges with outside parties.

•    Insured institutions should be using computer programs that have been fixed and tested to deal with Year 2000 problems.

-- Hoffmeister (hoff_meister@my-dejanews.com), April 14, 1999.

Off

-- Hoffmeister (hoff_meister@my-dejanews.com), April 14, 1999.