UK Chides Software Makers For Lacking Y2K Info

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UK Chides Software Makers For Lacking Y2K Info

Updated 11:19 AM ET August 27, 1999LONDON (Reuters) - Software package manufacturers are not all providing sufficiently clear information about their products' millennium compliance, a research by the Y2K bug campaign group Action 2000 revealed Friday.

Businesses surveyed for Action 2000's "State of the Nation" report complained that some manufacturers failed to explain the apparently changing compliance status of key software packages like Word 97, FileMaker Pro 4, Excel 95, Quickbooks 3, Outlook 98 and Windows NT Site Server Enterprise 2.

"I am concerned that businesses have been lulled into a false sense of security and that they are not being sufficiently prompted by manufacturers to recheck their software packages to ensure that they have not regressed to a non-compliant status," said Action 2000 Chairman Don Cruickshank in a statement.

Action 2000 had identified 24 software products from its database that have apparently changed compliance status in recent months.

Cruickshank said research into software manufacturers and over 3000 businesses' state of readiness revealed that the change in status of major packages had had a real and negative impact on UK businesses.

"This is an alarming situation at this late stage," he said.

According to the survey, 43 percent of companies with more than 250 employees have reported software manufacturers downgrading some product compliance. Just over half of the FTSE 500 companies sampled have experienced change in product compliance and two in five of these stated that this has caused a significant delay to their Y2K preparations.

Action 2000 had alerted the IT Group of the National Infrastructure Forum and was seeking their support.

Cruickshank urged businesses to consult on Action 2000's Software Status Database, which provides information on the millennium status of major software packages. The database is available via the Action 2000 Web site on www.bug2000.co.uk.

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Hard to keep up with the y2k news these days.

Ray

-- Ray (ray@totacc.com), August 27, 1999


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