MAJOR UK fleets are demanding a cast iron guarantee from their suppliers that they are millennium compliant, and threatening to strike them off supply lists if this is not forthcoming. Insurance giant GAN has written to its suppliers, including Lease Plan, asking what procedures they have in place, or are putting in place to ensure there is no disruption to services following the year 2000 date change.

The letter warns: 'While we are sure that you have considered the situation and will be working on how it may impact on your services, we require a guarantee that you have procedures in place and what the escalation process will be should a situation arise. Failure to reply may affect your position on GAN's approved supplier listing.'

Lease Plan took nine months to complete the conversion project, which ensured all its computer systems were year 2000 compliant. The year 2000 creates major problems for some older computer systems, and the prospect of an IT crash at midnight on December 31, 1999 are possible. The issue arises from the failure of some IT systems, whether software or hardware, to identify a date in more than a two-digit form.

As a result only the last two digits of a date are recognised, which means that when 1999 becomes the year 2000, the computer will be unable to adjust to a system which has apparently gone back in time, i.e. from 99 to 00.