>>I would propose that the field should be character and converted to numeric when calculations need to be done.
>
>Thank you for your reponse Jim.
>
>Changing the structure now from Numeric to Character means digging into code to see all areas that have been impacted - which is wuaht I may have to do ultimately. Actually, this field has no calculations at all - keeps me wondering why the previous person declared that field as a numeric one.

Henry,

I can understand the issue, but just keep in mind, it will never be easier to fix it later, it only gets more difficult.