thanks. well,here is more information. a component part numbers list is imported into a crystal report, and then from there, into an excel spreadsheet. personally i don't see why the macola manager would do such a thing, but so be it. Now the phantom number appears in the excel spreadsheet as a five digit number, and we do not have any five digit numbers. if you shrink the cell in excel, then it becomes 5 # signs. in other words, something has become corrupt in the import process. I told the MIS person to delete this component PN and then close, reboot and add that number back in. anyway, sounds like it is not something in the report process. the strange thing is that in the long list no other component PN behaves this way. since this apparently has been happening for some years, can't blame it on Macola.