Look at the COUNTIF() function. Example
=COUNTIF(A2:A500,"MET") or =COUNTIF(A2:A500,"=MET")

"Ian Bendall" wrote:

I use an Excel spreadsheet to track and add up time used on various
activities, one sheet pet group, I can add up the number stuff OK but
I need to count the number of occurances of type of transaction eg
Meeting = MET and Telephone conversation + TEL, to produce an itemised
summary, I need to know how many meetings or Tel Conversations etc,
the list of codes, 12 in all can sometimes be hundreds long but they
are all in one column, so I need 12 boxes to say how many of each type
of code.
Thanks in anticipation