>>This is because one byte is reserved for the +/- sign. Numerics are stored as
>>character strings of digits, the +/- sign and the decimal point are literally
>>stored as part of the number.
>
>Oh, ok, that makes more sense: I thought it was reserved for the decimal point. :-)

Garrett,

You're right and I stnad corrected. The format of 5,2 leaves one byte for the decimal point and four bytes for the digits. If you make the fomrat of the field 6,2 then you can strore 3 digits a point and two digits. But if you ever store a negative number you must allow for the - sign.

Numeric 6,2

111.11 resutls in 111.11
-111.11 results in ******