Last Meeting Report

oint meeting of our club and Quarry Club was held on 1999/04/08.

President Nick with a snow tan from Whistler, B.C., CANADA welcome all visiting Rotarian, Rotary Club of Quarry Bay, and guests.

Fellowship Chairman PP Gaston, coming back from a boat race http://home.netvigator.com/~gcwchan/public_html/index.html, introducing Visiting Rotarians

Rtn. Mathew Oddie, John Sellery, Marina Lui, President Stephen Tsai, PP Tony Leung, PP Patrick Parnell- Edward of Rotary Club of Quarry Bay.

President Walter Li of Rotary Club of Hong Kong

I brought 2 guest of Mr. Thomas Yeung and Miss Angela Yeung. PP Patrick P. Edward brought Mr. David Hall and Mr. Allan Wong.

Rtn. Marion announced that fines totaled $1040, and the raffle raised $470, making a total of 1,510.

President Nick attended Rotary Club meeting in Whistler at 7AM properly plan for the local ski lifts opening at 8:30AM, and he brought back a flag of course.

Because of a donation error, we auctioned a gift certificate of Brooks Brothers. Rtn. Bob out-bided others to extend his wardrobe

SPEAKER:

Program Chairman Bob introduced our speaker Mr. Chris Carroll . He has been a Rotarian for 14 years, and his current club is Golden Mile. Before coming to HK, he has been to New Zealand and Australia. His company is Asia Information Management. His topic today is "Y2K and its effect"

He pointed out the seriousness of the Y2K problem by stating the resource spent by corporations. Citibank spent US$ 630 million dollar. HK Telecom spent $18 million. On top of the money spent, the deadline is not movable.

A business will be possibly affected externally by its bank inability to process information, customer(s) inability to pay because of banking system malfunctions, supplier(s) won't be able to delivery because of production failure. Internally, production may fail; financial transaction stopped; and / or accounting system malfunction or miscalculate.

Most insurance policies will not cover such failure. Lawsuits and people in denial are occurring similar to the HK Airport failure during its opening. Mr. Carrall suggested obtaining legal opinion & exposure on this Y2K subject. HK law has 6 or 15 years of limitation depending on the type of contract.

Companies' directors could be responsible for Y2K losses too. Document your current Y2K prevention or correction action can improve your Y2K readiness. In addition, proof of compliance will help. For example writing to your suppliers regarding product/service compliance to Y2K. But Mr. Carrall warned that you couldn't rely on compliance letter if the product/service in question is critical to your business operation.

The speaker noted several Y2K-related incidents:

In Australia, 1996 Feb, a leap year error in the computer system caused a chemical plant fire burning down 7 million dollar of production equipment.
In Singapore, last year, its Taxi suffered a temporary halt in their meters.
In US, doctors are giving out incorrect prescription because of patients' information mismatched due to dates.
US CIA is worried about Russia's nuclear industry.
British government is suggesting to stock 2 weeks food supply during changeover to the next century. Our speaker suggested stocking extra water and batteries too.
US / Canada /Australia are printing extra money for extra circulation volume near December. Our speaker suggested get your $2000 cash now. Don㦙 wait till the end.
Taiwan may experience a 15% dropped in GDP due to Y2K problems.

Contingency Plan for Y2K failure is also good. But it requires practice. A plan locking in the safe is not good during emergency.

The only good thing mentioned was "buy your champagne future now."

President Nick thanking our speaker while forecasting a good year end for lawyers and computer people.

Announcement:

QUARRY BAY CLUB IS MOVING TO NEW LOCATION - BUTTERFIELD CLUB Quarry Bay area effective now.

April 15th : 6PM Board Meeting at HKCC. Then regular dinner meeting.

April 28th : Horserace Night - Fellowship program. Your betting [attendance] counts as a make up.

June 13 - 16: Rotary International Convention Singapore. DG mentioned that there will be 120+ attendee from HK with more to come.

PS: Swiss Air is NOT flying 2 days before or after the turn of the century. More European airlines may follow. Jan. 3rd, 2000 is Monday. UK will be a public holiday.

PPS. Rtn. Kishore found an interesting website

>FROM THE HONG KONG UNIVERSITY OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY OS A BOOK >The Y2K Handbook for PC Go to www.cyber.ust.hk and to publications

>great for testing your PC.

>AND YOU CAN GET A FREE HARD COPY.

> Regards