The information in the following MSKB article may help explain the problem:
Floating-point arithmetic may give inaccurate results in Excel
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/78113
SundanceKidLudwig wrote:
Debra,
Thank you for getting back to me on this. The thing is the formulas
involved are only addition and subtraction at 2 decimal places. I rechecked
each cell involved by adding or subtracting the cell amount to ensure it was
zero and all cells except 1 showed "-" as the total. The cell in question is
a formula that takes the result of 1 cell, 90,413.63 and subtracts 90,150.98
which equals 262.65. If I subtract 262.65 from formula in that cell I get
0.00. When I expand it to 24 places the resulting number is
0.000000000008753886504564. I understand why the cell shows 0.00 but I don't
understand how the result of 262.65 is really 262.650000000009000000000000
especially when the two components are only 2 decimal places. Other similar
formulas are not presenting this same problem. I don't get it. Thank you
again for any insight to this issue.
"Debra Dalgleish" wrote:
If the cells contain formulas, one cell may return a value that's very
small, e.g. .00000000001
This would display as zero in the cell, due to rounding. The cells that
actually contain zero show a dash.
SundanceKidLudwig wrote:
I have formatted cells with the accounting format with no symbol. Two cells
that compute to zero show differently. One shows 0.00 and the other shows a
"-" dash. I have rechecked all of the cells that are included in the formula
for each and I cannot find any inconsistencies; all are formatted the same.
I realize that this seems petty but for the life of me I cannot determine why
the same formatting shows two different designations for zero. I prefer the
"-" dash.
Can anyone suggest what I can look at to try and resolve this?
Thank you.
--
Debra Dalgleish
Excel FAQ, Tips & Book List
http://www.contextures.com/tiptech.html
--
Debra Dalgleish
Excel FAQ, Tips & Book List
http://www.contextures.com/tiptech.html