It sounds like the cells have been formatted as text.

Select the offending range
format|cells|Number tab|general (or anything but text)
and reenter the formula.

Or

You could be looking at formulas.
In xl2003:
Tools|Options|view tab|uncheck formulas



James Irwin wrote:

hi - i must have hit a setting somehow as all new formulae i enter into
excel, do not return the result of the formulae - they just return the
formulae itself (e.g. =e1). Existing formulae are not displayed so it's not a
ctrl + ` issue! any help appreciated.

--

Dave Peterson