[tz] NZ Leap Day Self Pay Petrol Pump Failures

[Tim Parenti]

On Fri, 1 Mar 2024 at 09:30, Paul Gilmartin via tz <tz at iana.org> wrote:

> > https://japannews.yomiuri.co.jp/society/general-news/20240229-171789/
> >
> I could imagine such a problem's arising from an attempt to compute
> the expiration date by adding an odd number of years to the
> issue date.


If that were all it was, I feel like the issue would have likely cropped up
sooner than 2024.  Speculating for a bit for fun…

In Japan, a lot of official documentation is done using the "gengō" or
regnal year.  When the era changed in 2019, for example, this led some
ATMs, which used the regnal year internally, to think it was 1989:
https://soranews24.com/2019/04/30/atms-in-japan-are-saying-theyll-transfer-your-money-back-in-time-to-1989/

Until recently, Japanese driver's licenses used regnal years only.  (Based
on image searches, it seems they've recently added the Gregorian year as
well.)  It's plausible that the relevant software systems still use the
regnal year internally.

During the previous Heisei (平成) era, leap years were divisible by four
(e.g., 平成20年 = 2008, 平成24年 = 2012, 平成28年 = 2016), but in the current Reiwa
(令和) era, they instead leave a remainder of two (e.g., 令和2年 = 2020, 令和6年 =
2024).  It's plausible someone did not realize such rules would need to be
updated with the era change.

As for why it wouldn't have cropped up in 2020 instead?  … Leap Day was a
Saturday.  It's plausible that the relevant offices were closed for
business and no licenses were issued or renewed.

--
Tim Parenti
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