This could make things faster for you. After importing the data, choose
another cell that is formatted as General or a number and enter 1 (the number
one).

Select the cell with the 1 in it and use Edit -- Copy (or [Ctrl]+[C]) and
then select all of the cells you imported that need reformatting and use
Edit -- Paste Special
and choose two options in the dialog: 'Values' and in the lower area
choose 'Multiply'.

That should get all numbers that were displayed as text to convert to real
numbers.

Hope that helps.

"Kate" wrote:

When I import data into Excel 2003, the numbers need to be reformatted so
that they can be calculated. But when I highlight the range and reformat it
to a number format, it doesn't register the change. I have to click inside
the cell contents (hit F2) for it to 'accept' the new format. This
complicates things when there is a lot of data.

Any ideas? Thanks for any help.