Removing apostraphes from a group of cells on an Excel spreadsheet

[woodeaglevigil]

I exported a query from a Microsoft Access database to a Microsoft Excel
spreadsheet. In this query were phone numbers for 369 people (with each
person and his or her data on a different row in the spreadsheet). When I
exported the query to an Excel and changed the cell formats to the
Special-Phone Number fonts, it didn't change the display of the numbers. It
still showed all phone numbers as 1234567890 instead of (123) 456-7890.

What is causing this is that there is an ' in front of each of the numbers.
When I remove the apostraphe from the number is changes the phone number to
the format I want it in.

However, I was wanting to know if there is a quick way I can remove the
apostraphes from all 360 phone numbers at once instead of having to remove
the apostraphes individually one at a time.

 

[Susan]

you can just use "Edit & Replace" & replace the apostrophe with
nothing..........
hope that helps!

susan

 

[Pete_UK]

Click on an empty cell somewhere that is formatted as General, then
click <copy>. Then highlight all the cells in your list of phone
numbers and Edit | Paste Special | Values (check) | Add (check) | OK
then <Esc>. Then you can apply the special phone number format.

You could also use Data | Text-to-columns with the cells highlighted,
and click <Finish> on the first panel.

Hope this helps.

Pete

 

[Rick Rothstein]

Try selecting all the cells in the column with your "phone number", click
Data/TextToColumns on Excel's menu bar and then immediately click the Finish
button when the dialog box appears.