Word 2007 Mail Merge puts in a space for empty fields from Excel 2

[SlowHnds]

Mail merge in Word 2007 data file is Excel spreadsheet 2007. When I merge the
document (Word 2007) with the data file (Excel 2007) and there is empty
fields in the data file, Word inserts a space. I don't want it to enter
anything.

field names in excel

Salute FirstName MidInital LastName Mail1 Mail2 location Prov Postcode

When I merge this to a document that is

Dear <<Salute>> <<FirstName>> <<MidInital>> LastName

Thank you for your ......


If the excel spread sheet contains a blank (null) field, when the word
document is merged it inserts a space. How do I stop this where the field is
empty don't put in anything, no space, just skip to the next field.

So I could get

Dear Simpson

Thank you for ......

......

Instead I get

Dear ___ (3 spaces) Simpson,

 

[Peter Jamieson]

Dear{ MERGEFIELD Salute \b" " }{ MERGEFIELD FirstName \b" " }{
MERGEFIELD MidInitial \b" " }{ MERGEFIELD LastName \b" " }

Where all the {} are the special field code braces you can insert using
ctrl-F9 and toggle using Alt-F9.

This only works on recent versions of Windows Word

Peter Jamieson

http://tips.pjmsn.me.uk

 

[SlowHnds]

This keeps the spaces when I tested it in MS Word 2007.

I want MS Word not to do anything if the merge field in Excel is empty/null.
NO space added.

Dwade

 

[Peter Jamieson]

Did you ensure that there are no spaces between the fields?

i.e.

Dear{ MERGEFIELD Salute \b" " }{ MERGEFIELD FirstName \b" " }{
MERGEFIELD MidInitial \b" " }{ MERGEFIELD LastName \b" " }

not

Dear { MERGEFIELD Salute \b" " } { MERGEFIELD FirstName \b" " } {
MERGEFIELD MidInitial \b" " } { MERGEFIELD LastName \b" " }

Another aproach is to use IF fields:

Dear{ IF "{ MERGEFIELD Salute }" = "" "" " { MERGEFIELD Salute }" }

and so on

Peter Jamieson

http://tips.pjmsn.me.uk

 

[SlowHnds]

Ok, I got it now and I understand how the \b switch works in this instance,
only adds a space between populated fields, not null.

Thanks for the post. I now have 850 letters correctly spaced.