Numbers not adding up!

I sometimes find when I download an excel fiie from a website that the numbers in the cells do not respond as numbers although they appear as such.
For instance they will not add up, they'll just give a '#Value!' sign in the summation cell. I then have to laboriously re-type each number over itself in order to get the excel sheet to function.
Is there a way to get over this please? Am I doing something wrong during the download? Thanks in advance for any advice.

Paul - AppleMac Air with Os X85 and ExcelMac 2011.

You can select a column, then go to Data|Text to Columns and simply hit Finish. This should coerce them to numbers.

NBVC said:

You can select a column, then go to Data|Text to Columns and simply hit Finish. This should coerce them to numbers.

Click to expand...

Thanks very much but it doesn't work! I select the column, go Data|Text to Columns and then 'finish' but it stays the same, ie the numbers still don't add up. The Data Wizard identifies the data as 'delimited' if that's any help.

What do you think?

Paul

Perhaps there are some bidden non printable chars. Try dong a CTRL+H and hold the ALT key while typing 032 using only the number pad.

NBVC said:

Perhaps there are some bidden non printable chars. Try dong a CTRL+H and hold the ALT key while typing 032 using only the number pad.

Click to expand...

Thank you NBVC. I don't understand what you mean though. Cntrl H gives me a find & replace panel and I don't have a number pad. Can you explain what you mean please? Regards Paul

The format inside the cell is obviously a text format - not a numeric format, but how to change it? Paul

Yes it is the find/replace tool. We want to replace any hidden character with a null in order to coerce numbers. By the number pad I mean the numbers at the right side of the keyboard and not across the top.

NBVC said:

Yes it is the find/replace tool. We want to replace any hidden character with a null in order to coerce numbers. By the number pad I mean the numbers at the right side of the keyboard and not across the top.

Click to expand...

OK, I understand, so what can I do as I do not have a number pad? I presume the 032 is a carriage return but why can't I enter it from the top row? Paul