the computer age. Instead, with their ease of use, computers have encouraged employees to churn out bales of draft copies of documents, printed by ever fancier machines. It takes just a simple command after all.

Electronic data interchange (EDI), which has been around for 30 years in various forms, holds out the hope for cutting down the paperwork and the need to key information into computers at each stage of business to business transactions. EDI is the unwieldy coinage created by the techno whizzes to describe in general a system of electronically transferring business documents over a computer network using a standard format.

EDI allows institutions which conduct business with each other to do so by computer, automating many functions such as the creating, sending, receiving and processing of purchase orders, invoices, payments, bills of lading and the like.

It was first developed by the US transportation industry but it has slowly spread to a wider range of sectors from banking to health care. Here in Bermuda an EDI system is being developed for use by Customs to cut down on the paperwork required to handle the 200,000 transactions -- or bills of entry for goods -- the department handles each year.

Since 80 percent of the transactions stem from about 20 companies, the goal is to bring all of them on-line as a means of clearing goods electronically. It promises to be faster, and more efficient method. But the system is not quite there yet. The system is currently dormant after an initial pilot test to make sure it worked.

The second stage is to get companies to standardise their computer systems so they can communicate documents and transactions with each other. That could take some time as there is some expenditure to be made and training to be done before everyone fully trusts that it could work.

Setting up the process will eventually involve Customs, port and airport authorities, other government departments, the shippers, the banks, retailers, suppliers, and the freight companies.

Customs, Aircraft Services Bermuda Ltd., Stevedoring Services Ltd., Bermuda Container Line Ltd., Gorham's Ltd., the Bank of N.T. Butterfield and Son Ltd., Holmes Williams & Purvey Ltd., Gibbons Management Services, Bermuda Forwarders Ltd., Butterfield & Vallis, Fast Foward Freight Ltd., and International Bonded Couriers of Bermuda Ltd. have all become involved in the project. The process, which has been on going for 18 months is being ushered along by Onlines Systems Ltd., which is in partnership with the Bermuda Telephone Co. Ltd.

"We are now at the stage where we have to build people's trust in the system,'' said Michael Oatley, who heads government's computer section. "We have to make EDI transactions a low risk decision so it becomes a routine procedure.'' Typically in a simplified transaction, when a company orders goods from overseas the supplier sends it an invoice. Gorham's is currently doing EDI transactions with its US supplier, so it's ahead in the technology.

The supplier sends the order to a freight company which then issues a manifest document and a bill of lading to the shipping company. The shipper bringing the goods in sends a bill of lading to Customs, Stevedoring Services. The shipper also sends a bill of lading and freight invoice to the company ordering the goods. The company completes a customs declaration form, and someone takes this along with the bill of lading and the invoice from the overseas supplier down to Customs and stands in line.

Customs inspects the paperwork, matches it up with the bill of lading, assesses the duty and the company hands over a cheque.

EDI-ing those reams of paperwork The company also settles its fees with the shipping company, Stevedoring Services, and other parties who handled the transaction. Customs gives the company a release form which is then taken down to the dock and if there are not problems the goods are free to be taken away. Along the way there are multiple copies of documents.

In an EDI transaction there would be "bundles'' of documents sent electronically. Payments between parties would also be conducted over the network and Customs would release the documents once it received a confirmation that the bank had transferred the necessary duty to government.

There would be no need to re-key information and possibly enter mistakes along the way.

Government's computer section is recommending that when EDI gets underway, the transactions be kept as paperless as possible. That's unlike in the UK and Canada where Customs requires a paper trail after the EDI transaction has been completed. The US doesn't require the paperwork, but conducts random post-audit inspections of records. The decision to go completely electronic in Bermuda will ultimately have to be made by the Collector of Customs Gerry Ardis.

If the move toward EDI works, the technology impact will eventually mean some legislative change, a reorganisation of Customs, and perhaps even of the way in which tariffs are structured. It could potentially help free up Customs officials to do more inspection of goods and catch some of those shady imports into the Island. What could hold it up is the inability of people, businesses and government to adapt to a technology. It's a process of getting rid of the paper crutches and hoping the electronics will support the system. Look ma, no hands.

Here's one company that's found a ride on the EDI bandwagon. General Electric Co. (GE) said yesterday it was buying more than $1 billion in goods and services yearly using a system it calls Trading Process Network Extranet. The company expects to use it to buy $5 billion by 2000.

The company estimates it has saved about 30 percent in costs compared to using traditional methods of procurement. GE makes a wide variety of products, from light bulbs to jet engines. The company is now offering the system, which it developed, for sale to other businesses.

"You need to have an in-depth understanding of the two forces here -- one that's electronic and one, what business-to-business is all about,'' Gartner Group analyst Barbara Reilly told Bloomberg business news service.

Tech Tattle is a weekly column which focuses on technological developments and computer industry issues. If you have any ideas for topics or a business you would like to discuss, please call Mr. ElAmin at 295-5881, ext. 241, or at home 238-3854.