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Data won't sort in numerical order?

Posted by Julie on April 26, 2001 11:32 AM

Help - I'm having a problem that sounds basic but I can't seem to see what I am doing wrong. I have a list of employee numbers that I need to sort in numeric order. Our old employee numbers were 9 digits long, with the first 3 digits being zeros. Our new numbers are still nine digits long, but begin w/ "150". When I try to sort the list, some of the 150 beginning numbers go to the beginning of my listing and some to the end??? Any ideas what I am doing wrong?

Posted by Barrie Davidson on April 26, 2001 11:44 AM

Is all your data numeric? It sounds like some of your data may be text.

Posted by Mark W. on April 26, 2001 11:45 AM

You probably have a mixture of text and numeric
values.

Posted by Julie on April 26, 2001 1:10 PM

THANKS - THAT WAS THE PROBLEM...I HAD A MIXTURE OF TEXT & NUMERIC VALUES EVEN THOUGH I HAD FORMATTED THE CELLS AS NUMERIC...SOME STILL WERE SHOWING AS TEXT CELLS AND THEREFORE NOT SORTING CORRECTLY. TO FIX THIS - I COPIED THE LIST OF NUMBERS INTO "NOTEPAD" AND THEN COPIED THEM BACK OUT TO EXCEL AND THE TEXT ASSOCIATION WAS DELETED AND NOW IT SORTS CORRECTLY.

THANKS.