Hi Henry.

Problem is that the phone number has been declared as numeric and padL might not work.

Really? Why? Exactly how many mathemetical computations do you do with telephone numbers < s > ?

Having said that, PADL() will still work with numeric data, but it has the effect of transforming it into character data.

Also, just an FYI, you can use the STRFILTER function in FoxTools to accomplish the same thing that Nadja an Gerald have showed you with CHRTRAN:

SET LIBRARY TO FOXTOOLS ADDITIVE
lcNewString = STRFILTER( lcOldString, '0123456789' )