I've never seen any problem using any characters in =vlookup().

But I have seen the N/A error when there isn't a match.

You checked to see if the lengths were the same. How about just checking to see
if the values are the same:

=a1=sheet2!a99

Adjust the addresses to match.

I'm wondering if the space character in one cell is reall the plain old space
character--maybe it's the HTML non-breaking space (did you grab the data from
the web???).

Chip Pearson has a very nice addin that will help determine what's in the cell:
http://www.cpearson.com/excel/CellView.aspx

MWS-C360 wrote:

I'm using the VLOOKUP formula and I cannot determine why there is no return
on certain records, which should have a return.

For instance, I execute a macro to perform the VLOOKUP on one list, which
entries like: (TEXT)(SPACE)&(SPACE)(TEXT). The list I am cross referencing
has the exact same listing (ie I check =LEN and they match, I compared via an
IF statement and they match), yet I get #NA. The listing are text and the
range_lookup is not valued in the formula, so my thought is that the "&"
character may be the issue.

So, Are there any characters that cannot be used in combination with the
VLOOKUP formula - If yes, is there a site which I can obtain the list?

Any and all help will be appreciated - Thank You

--

Dave Peterson