Thanks everyone...of course, I have already modified the formula to a vlookup
which works just fine...just was trying to understand which version of
Microsoft Excel was the culprit in terms of limiting the nested if statement
levels to 7 or less...the file that had the issue was one that I inherited,
created by someone in Excel 2003...so I am guessing Excel 2003 was able to
handle more than 7 nested if levels.

The person who originally gave me the file to work on with the nested if
statements (to whom I have returned the updated file) was wondering why I
needed to update their file to get rid of the nested if 7+ level
formula...didn't really have a good answer other than when I tried to save to
an Excel 97-2003 from Excel 2007, I got compatability warnings.

Still not really getting the answer but do appreciate the suggestions.
"Ron Rosenfeld" wrote:

On Mon, 6 Oct 2008 14:36:32 -0700, Ed C <Ed wrote:

I am using Excel 2007, co-workers still on Excel 2003. When I work on
something, I save to 97-2003 .xls to be able to share files. I only use
Excel 2007 file save when I am downloading data from a database that needs to
use more rows..anyway...I had a file someone shared with me (created in Excel
2003) and it had a nested if statement with 11 levels. I used the file but
when I went to save it as 97-2003, I received a compatability warning about
only allowing 7 levels..is that due to versions 97, 2000, 2002 of Excel??
(Oddly enought, if I save to 95/5.0, it doesn't give me that compatability
message)

It would be interesting to try it and see what happens. I believe Harlan has
written that the problem with the nesting limitation in pre-Excel 2007 lies
with the formula parser. But that formulas with more nesting than the seven
can be developed in Open Office, and then saved and re-opened in earlier
versions of Excel.

If that also holds true for Excel 2007, the end result may be that your
colleagues will be able to use the sheet, but, of course, they may not be able
to edit that formula.
--ron