Figured it out, there are thousands of people who have had the same
problem , not surprisingly ... unbelievably this is a design feature!!!
WTF? Bloody Microsoft ...

From:
http://tinyurl.com/fz7ju
Word and Excel 2003 Mail Merge - Date or Number Does Not Display
Properly

When you mail merge Word 2003 with Excel 2003 date and number formats
are lost
and so you need to persuade Word to format the numbers and dates.

Formatting Word ‘fields’ to display two decimal places:
1. open Word document that has the problem - see the document
containing fields.
2. right click on the field name e.g. - see pop-up menu.
3. click on the ‘Toggle Field Codes’ option - see field expand e.g. {
MERGEFIELD “Total” }
4. edit the field to include \# ###0.00 e.g. { MERGEFIELD “Total” \#
##0.00 }
5. preview your mail merge - see numbers with two decimal places.

The are other ways of displaying numbers:
- no decimal places: \# ##0
- three decimal places: \# ##0.000
- include commas and two decimal places: \# #,##0.00
- include currency sign, commas and two decimals: \# £#,##0.00
The rules are as follows:
0 - always display a number e.g.123 displayed ‘through \# 000000.00 is:

000123.00
# - show only ‘significant numbers’ e.g. 123 displayed through \#
###0.00 is:
123.00

Formatting dates:
1. right click on the field name e.g. - see pop-up menu.
2. click on the ‘Toggle Field Codes’ option - see field expand e.g. {
MERGEFIELD “Date” }
3. edit the field to include \@ “dd MMMM yy” e.g. { MERGEFIELD “Date”
\@ “dd
MMMM yy” }
4. preview your mail merge - see date in the format 1 April 05.

Full stops or slashes can be included.

The rules are as follows:
dd - day as two numbers e.g. 01
d - single figures drop the zero e.g. 1.
dddd - day of the week e.g. Tuesday
ddd - day of the week in three letters e.g. Tue
MM - month as two figures e.g. 04
M - single figures drop the zero e.g. 4
MMMM - month in words e.g. April
MMM - month as three letters e.g. Apr
yy - year in two figures e.g. 05
yyyy - year in four figures e.g. 2005


--
CFD


------------------------------------------------------------------------
CFD's Profile: http://www.excelforum.com/member.php...o&userid=27306
View this thread: http://www.excelforum.com/showthread...hreadid=560905