I have used text based functions to extract numeric text values from a text string. I.e. the text string in a cell contained =<4%, and I pulled out the 4%. The 4% is left aligned in the cell because it is still being recognized as text by excel, I believe. However, when I go to reformat the cell using the format option to make it a 2 decimal number (e.g. .04), it doesn't work. However, if I go I hit f2 to edit the contents and escape out the format will change. Is there an easier way than hitting f2 / enter to reformat the cells?