Unwanted information appears in a Merge Field in MS Word.

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aukooze91 - 17 Nov 2004 16:19 GMT

I am merging information from a table I created in MS Access w/ an MS Word
Mail Merge Document. In MS Access, the table is updated after I press a
button on a form. The old data is deleted and then new data is entered from
a data entry form. The problem I have is with a Date field in the Mail Merge
Document. The field from the MS Access table does not have data located in
it, but when you view the Mail Merge Document with the Merged data (from the
MS Access Table), the Current Date (or Today's Date) appears when the field
should be blank. What can I do? I don't want any info appearing in the
field if their is not any information in the table. In other words, I want
it to be blank. I am using MS Access 2002 and MS Word 2002, from the MS
Office Professional.

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Doug Robbins - 18 Nov 2004 00:51 GMT

Create a query in Access to use as the datasource. In the query, include a
function to display the date if it exists, or nothing if it doesn't

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Hope this helps,
Doug Robbins - Word MVP

>I am merging information from a table I created in MS Access w/ an MS Word
> Mail Merge Document. In MS Access, the table is updated after I press a
[quoted text clipped - 13 lines]
> it to be blank. I am using MS Access 2002 and MS Word 2002, from the MS
> Office Professional.

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aukooze91 - 19 Nov 2004 16:09 GMT

Maybe I was unclear. The data in the Access Table is formatted correctly.
When this data is delivered to my MS Word, Merge Document, the Current
Date/Today's date is placed in the data field in word (and this field should
be blank), when this field has no data delivered from the MS Access Table.
Appreciate the previous response.

> Create a query in Access to use as the datasource. In the query, include a
> function to display the date if it exists, or nothing if it doesn't
[quoted text clipped - 16 lines]
> > it to be blank. I am using MS Access 2002 and MS Word 2002, from the MS
> > Office Professional.

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Doug Robbins - 20 Nov 2004 00:57 GMT

No, you were not unclear. The issue is that a date field will always
produce a "date" even when there is no date entered into the field. By
using a Query in Access, you can convert the output of the date field to
text and then when you execute the merge, you are using a text field rather
than a date field, so you will avoid the problem.

Signature

> Maybe I was unclear. The data in the Access Table is formatted correctly.
> When this data is delivered to my MS Word, Merge Document, the Current
[quoted text clipped - 30 lines]
>> > MS
>> > Office Professional.

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aukooze91 - 20 Nov 2004 13:57 GMT

I did what you suggested and created seperate fields (from the original date
fields) in the query with a function for each of the date fields needed, that
will show the date only if the field contains a date. I then linked the
query directly to the MS Word Merge Document and it works perfectly. Before,
I had a query that created a table in MS Access and then I linked it to a MS
Word Merge Document, thus, creating the unwanted "Current Dates" appearing in
my MS Word Merge Document. Thanks for all your help.

> No, you were not unclear. The issue is that a date field will always
> produce a "date" even when there is no date entered into the field. By
[quoted text clipped - 36 lines]
> >> > MS
> >> > Office Professional.

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