Thaks very much the circular formula =IF(A1="","",IF(B1="",NOW(),B1)) was
spot on exactly what i was looking for.

"Niek Otten" wrote:

Look he

http://www.mcgimpsey.com/excel/timestamp.html

--
Kind regards,

Niek Otten
Microsoft MVP - Excel

"Dude3966" wrote in message ...
|i am building a form in excel and i need to place a date next to a cell when
| that cell has information entered into it. the problem is that every time the
| sheet recalculates the date changes, i don't want this to happen but the
| workbook still needs to recalculate as there are other formulas present. is
| there a way to restrict the number of times a specific cell can recalculate?