>I have used templates more in Word than in Excel, but I think it is the same idea: You normally don't open a template, to save it with a different name; instead, you directly create a new file, based on the template. I think that would be with the .Add() method.
>

This works as well.

excel = createobject('Excel.Application')
excel.Workbooks.Open('mytemplate.xlt')
excel.ActiveWorkbook.SaveAs('newexcelfile.xls')