I bet you and the recipient have different windows settings for the short date
format.

My bet is you use something like:
mm/dd/yy
and the recipient uses
mm/dd/yyyy

When you do Format|cells|Number tab and look at that cell's format, I'm betting
you see something like:

*03/14/2001

That asterisk means that you chose a short date format that is picked up from
the Windows Regional settings (Date tab).

xl2002+ is more honest with the way it deals with dates.

At the bottom of that dialog (xl2002+):

Date formats display date and time serial numbers as date values. Except for
items that have an asterisk (*), applied formats do not switch date orders with
the operating system.

Since yours is marked with an asterisk, your date will switch formats with the
setting in the OS.

==========
So you have a couple of choices--use a different format that isn't picked up
from the windows regional settings, widen the column, change the font size (or
change format|cells|alignment tab|check shrink to fit), or change your short
date format to be the longest it can be (I like mm/dd/yyyy).

Rachael wrote:

I created an excel sheet to track information. It's rather large. The sheet
is being sent once a week to a client, and when they get it, the columns
resize and some of the dates turn into #####. Why is that? What can I do to
stop it? The data is fine on my computer, why is it showing larger on other
people's systems?

I have all the columns "autofit" so that I can fit more data into a page, so
it's a tight fit. Will I just have to enlarge the columns?

--

Dave Peterson