Hello All, I'm using the VFPOLEDB driver to retrieve some data (dates) from a dbf table located on my LAN, when run on my development server (Win 2K) any dates that are empty come through as expected (i.e. '' when converted to a string ) but on my live server they come through as '30-12-1899' , both client machines are running XP SP2 with the same version of the VFPOLEDB driver ! any ideas ? thanks