Y2K leap year causes no major computer glitches

Except for a handful of minor glitches, no major problems related to the Feb. 29 leap year rollover occured in the United States or around the world, John Koskinen, chairman of the President's Council on Year 2000 Conversion, said Tuesday.

"But that does not mean that no one has had a computer problem," said Koskinen.

The Coast Guard experienced minor troubles archiving messages, some caller identification and pager models failed to reset the dates correctly-and Reagan Washington National Airport saw some longer lines at the check-in and baggage claims because the skycap computer system did not recognize the date, Koskinen said.

Only minor problems occurred internationally, as well. In Japan, receipt printers put the wrong date on some registered mail and the glitches caused some incorrect weather reports.

Bulgaria reported rejected passports and New Zealand had up to 4,000 electronic transfer problems. Koskinen said he does not expect the glitches to have any significant effect on normal operations.

The potential for problems on Feb. 29 and March 1 originate with three rules used to determine the occurrence of leap years. The first two rules hold that if a year is divisible by four, it is a leap year; if it is divisible by 100, it is a normal year. The third rule, which holds that years divisible by 400 are leap years, is sometimes overlooked.

Some computer programmers, unaware of the third rule, may have coded the year 2000 as a normal year. Experts believed that, if left unfixed, these errors could have caused problems in software used for record keeping or billing purposes, especially in cases where the number of days is central to the process being carried out.

Most systems were checked for the ability to handle the leap year rollover dates in the course of Y2K compliance testing. Dec. 31 also was checked, since some computer programs may not recognize that the year consisted of 366-not 365-days.

Expecting to find a few more minor glitches, the Y2K Council's Information Coordination Center will continue to monitor and report on any potential information system problems through Wednesday.

"This is the last time and last date that we will monitor," said Koskinen.