Negative value causing issues

**Speedbird1** · 09-01-2008, 09:58 AM

Hello all, i have what i thought would be a relativley easy problem to solve but i am struggling like mad with it. This is the problem. in Cell C3 i have 1158 and in Cell C4 i have 1163. C5 C6 C7 will when appropriate get numbers in as well. I want to subtract C3 from C4 and show the answer in D4 (the answer being 5 and being in D4) However when i continue the formatting down column D when i get a minus figure in D5 then the rest of the column is filled with zreos. That makes no sense so here is the sample from the sheet.
Any help please
Mike

**mikerickson** · 09-01-2008, 10:09 AM

When a formula refers to a blank cell, Excel interprets the blank as 0.
So your formula in D5 =C5-C4 = 0 - 1163 = -1163
and D6 = C5 - C5 = 0 - 0 = 0, etc.

You could use =MAX(C5-C4,0) to prevent the negative numbers.

I personaly would avoid formulas like =IF(ISNUMBER(C5),C5-C4,"") that leave a string where other formulas may expect a number.