>>Thanks a lot for your response. I put TOTAL in the first column at the very bottom. The mentioned code works fine in Excel 2003, >>but does nothing in Excel 2007.

>>How exactly do you suggest me to adjust it?

Naomi,
I've not used xlLastCell before, but as far as I can see in 2007 at least it is only return a selection to the last cell that has a value assigned, therefore in an empty column it only selects and assigns the FormatCondition to cell A1.

If you change your selection line as below it seems to work fine.

*!*loExcel.RANGE([A1], loExcel.SELECTION.SpecialCells(xlLastCell)).SELECT
loExcel.Columns("A:A").SELECT
loExcel.SELECTION.FormatConditions.DELETE
loExcel.SELECTION.FormatConditions.ADD(xlExpression,, '=UPPER(Left($A1,5))="TOTAL"')

WITH loExcel.SELECTION.FormatConditions(1)
.FONT.Bold = .T.
 .Interior.ColorIndex = 4
ENDWITH

Regards

Gary.