>>>I see You already got your answer, but, wouldn't this work?
>>>
>>>

>>>local laTotal(1)
>>>
>>>laTotal[1] = 0
>>>select SUM(JN6.nJN6_3) ... Into array laTotal
>>>
>>>* If there were no records "tallied", laTotal would still be 0
>>>
>>>LcMessage = "Amount of it is " + Transform(laTotal[1])
>>>

>>>
>>
>>on VFP9 aggregate functions, a value returns always, eventually NULL.
>>
>>Fabio
>
>Yes, it will return a zero or eventually null as you said, that is why I changed alltrim(str()) to transform, but if you do not want the "Amount of it is NULL" you can use, as you sugested, nvl(laTotal[1], 0), the point is that there is no need to check for _tally, AFAIK

Then you can to improve it:

SET NULLDISPLAY TO 'None'