Error when subtracting cells

[lemonap618]

Hello All,
I copied some data from online and what to simply subtract T4 - K4 where K4 is data I copied online.
I keep getting an error and cannot figure out why.

Regards,
Andrew

[AliGW]

Probably the 'numbers' are, in fact, text. But, sadly, my crystal ball is away for servicing, so unless you provide a sample workbook showing the issue, we'll never know.

[TMS]

Difficult for any of us to know too, given the information provided. Maybe the data copied from "online" is being seen as text. Or, quite often, data from online sources has non-breaking spaces at the end of the data.

You're probably going to need to post a sample workbook. See the yellow banner at the top of the page.

[MrShorty]

With the addition of the sample file, it can be seen that the values in column K are all "numbers stored as text". While you are at it, note that columns F, G, H, I, and J are also numbers/dates stored as text -- in case you would like to also address those columns while you are at it.

Excel strategies for converting numbers stored as text to numbers: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/...rs=en-us&ad=us Note that spreadsheets tend to use your operating system's regional settings for interpreting dates. The text dates in the file look like MDY dates, so my system will probably have no trouble correctly interpreting those dates, but your system may have trouble if it is looking for DMY or other date format.

I also observe that, if I open the sample file in LO Calc, that LO Calc automatically deals with the numbers stored as text and performs the subtraction without error.

[Norie]

In column K the commas and dollar signs are not coming from formatting, and there are non-printing characters, CHAR(160), in the cell too, so the values aren't really numeric.

[TMS]

... and there are non-printing characters, CHAR(160), in the cell too ...

Good to know we can guess with the best ... 😉.