You shouldn't be getting a VALUE message simply trying to add or subtract
from cells that may be blank. But

=IF(AND(ISBLANK(C1),ISBLANK(D1)),"",C1-D1)

is an example of how to choose whether or not to proceed with a calculation.

You can change AND to OR if you don't want any calculation done unless both
C1 and D1 aren't blank.



"Shooter" wrote in message
...
I am using 3 columns as follows:

C D
E
1 Budget Actual
Variance
3,000

I input values into cells C and D. Column D(Variance) is simply C-D. In
some
cases the cells in column D will be blank. I would like to write a simple
formula in column E that will give me the value of C-D and will prevent a
#Value error message if there is no value in C or D.

Thanks for your help.

Shooter