Several of the Island's major companies have issued no-vacation orders to all staff between November and January to ward off potential Y2K emergencies.

And an international IBM consultant told The Royal Gazette that such steps have landed Bermuda in line with countries leading the world in tackling the computer glitch which could derail economies not fully prepared for it.

IBM Canada project manager Paul Nangel has worked with the Bank of Butterfield since 1997 on their Year 2000 strategy.

His praise for compliance on the Island follows a recent report by the Connecticut-based Gartner Group which found Bermuda was among the ten most prepared countries in the world.

"The Bank is certainly up to par with all the banks in North America, the UK, Switzerland, Canada. These are the countries that have a good programme in place and they're widely recognised as being ready.'' he said.

"Some countries in Europe are a little behind and places like Russia and China are way behind. So is Africa. Russia in particular is a concern to everybody because they are not ready but they are quite mechanised.

"And it's not just hardware and software that needs to be ready, it's all external service providers, telephone, power companies.'' He said the Bank of N.T. Butterfield policy banning vacations between November and the end of January, was in line with many conglomerates like IBM itself where noone can take holidays this year between November and March.

The Bank of Bermuda has issued similar no-holiday notices to staff.

Bank of Butterfield's CEO and President Calum Johnston believes such stringent precautions are vital if Bermuda is to successfully tackle the glitch.

He says the bank will be so well-prepared that even if external problems resulted in the bank having no electricity, systems will run smoothly.

Staff would work manually for the first time in years and a massive new generator would be revved up for critical operations.

He is confident such steps, along with business and technical strategies, will guarantee the new millennium is trouble-free for customers and staff.

Mr. Johnston said he had granted permission for time-off between November and the end of January to only two "non-critical'' staff members of the several hundred who work at the bank.

"The main reason for this precaution is with the contingency plans if we need bodies to come in and do the work manually because of some system not being available we need to call them in.

"We don't want people to be off the Island if they're critical and even if they're not critical we may need the extra hands just to do things.'' He estimates his bank will fork out around $1 million for the direct cost of preparing for the Year 2000 bug.

Island `getting to grips with Y2K problem' And while much more was being spent in the lead up to January 1, 2000 a lot of that could be written off since many of the Bank's systems needed upgrading regardless of the impending glitch, he said.

Back in 1997 the head of the bank's Year 2000 project, Bryan Dowling, signed up IBM Canada to draw up the roadmap to compliance and provide technical expertise and strategies needed.

Mr. Dowling said within the next two or three weeks 100 percent of the bank's mission critical systems would be certified as compliant. He said the current target was that by the end of next month the Bank of Butterfield would be 100 percent Year 2000 ready -- although ongoing rehearsals would continue.

Then the business contingency or Plan B strategies would become the main focus as every member of staff learnt their role in maintaining full steam ahead at the Bank if any of the systems should fail due to outside forces.

IBM project manager Mr. Nangel said: "That's a vital part of planning for Y2K. It's not just about the software or hardware, having a safeguard measure in place so if for some reason or another the systems fail, your business will have a plan in place.

"Then you will have a crisis management team in place ready to execute those plans and get the bank back on its feet or whatever system is failing back in operation.''