mail merge adds characters

[Celine]

Hi,

All of a sudden when I merge from Excel to a Word doc, the merge has started
adding .0 to the end of all zip codes.

I have formatted the zip code cells as numbers without decimals and as zip
codes but it makes no difference. I have not made any changes to the merge
fields either.

Also, now when I go to choose my data source, it doesn't automatically show
me the tables available in the data source. I have to go to Options and
select System Tables to see them.

Any cure for either of the above?

Thanks,
Celine

 

[Bob I]

Text?

 

[Celine]

I presume you're suggesting I format the cells to text fields?

If so, still didn't work.

 

[Bob I]

Perhaps deleting the "current" Zip field and then reinserting it will
remove the "extra formatting"?

 

[Celine]

Hi Bob,

I have tried that, and I have also tried copying the text of my letter to a
new document and adding in all new merge fields. That doesn't fix it either.

I now have another problem with it. When I select the merge recipients that
I wish to merge to, it still merges to everything in the database! I have to
go find the ones that I want and print them individually!

It's just going from bad to worse!

Celine

 

[Bob I]

Somehow things have been changed and not for the better. Please
understand that "Excel" does "workbooks and spreadsheets", "Access" does
"databases and tables". As for forcing Excel to handle what is a number
as text, you can preface it with a '. So instead of 56890 you have
'56890, which will be considered text. As to merging the the entire
list, are you setting Clear all, and then ticking off the ones you want
merged? Occasionally I have had to completely break the document off
from any "data source" and save it. Then reopen and re-associate it and
reinsert the merge fields.

 

[dsables]

Celine.

i noticed this problem yesterday. I have a work around. Save the Excel file
as a .csv and use the.csv as your source in the mail merge. You will not see
the added .0 on the Zip Code field.

There seems to be a bigger problem with the ODBC excel driver. I am looking
for that fix.