1/1/11 is a nice-looking date, as sets of digits go. But M. reports that the new date caused a hiccup on the debit card that she uses for her Citibank checking account. But, wait–a Citibank representative assured her that everyone had problems with their cards right after the new year began. Really?

I had not seen a report of this problem that Citibank had on 1/1/11, and I found it funny when you think about all the energy and money spent on fixing the Y2K “bug”. My husband and I went out to dinner on New Year’s Eve and around midnight tried to pay our bill. The server couldn’t get either of our Citibank checking cards to go through, he kept getting an “invalid account” error. We paid another way and called Citibank, concerned that something was wrong with our account. After 40 min on hold, we gave up. We called again in the afternoon on Jan 1, and the person we spoke with said everything was fine with our account, but that the bank system had not reacted well to 1/1/11 as a date, and for some period of time around midnight no one’s card was working. I don’t know how long the issue lasted, or if, in fact, all Citibank cards were effected. Had I not had another way to pay, I’d probably find this less amusing.

Did this happen to anyone else out there in Consumeristland? Please let us know, in the comments or by e-mail.

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