FoxPro 2.6 would set the length of a numeric field to whatever was needed to store the value in the first record selected. I haven't tried to see if VFP behaves the same way. I was experiencing a problem in 2.6 similar to Mark and it took me forever to figure out what was going on. I seem to remember using the "0.000" to fix the problem. Maybe VFP behaves differently.

>I can't tell you for sure. The way that I learned this was trying to get an empty numeric field in the results of a cursor, and getting it big enough to be able to put decimals in later.
>
>SELECT 0.000 AS NumField
>
>did not work.
>
>SELECT 1.000 * 0 AS NUmField
>
>Does. Go figure. Something to do with how SQL decides to format the column before the SELECT ever runs.
>
>
>>THANKS Erik... that worked perfectly! But that is a "work around" isn't it? Am I not understanding something, why does it drop the decimals when the return value at the RETURN statement in the function has the decimals???
>>
>>>Try this:
>>
>>> SELECT table.fieldone, table.fieldthree, table.fieldthree,;
>>> 1.000 * GetAmount(table.duedate) AS howmuch ;
>>> FROM table ;
>>> INTO CURSOR cTemp