I have searched and found references to converting text to dates. I need to go the other way. I have client# field and a date field. I would like to make an update query to populate a new field by concatenating the two fields minus the "/". I am making a new key field in an existing table. Then in the future when data entry is done, I would like to convert the date and client# as they are entered. I was looking at using the left$ or right$ function, but the dates may be in mm/dd/yyyy format or m/dd/yyyy format or m/d/yyyy and so on, depending on the month and day. Is there an easy way to convert the date to a number? I tried datevalue, but it leaves the "/" in there. I'm not sure how to section off the parts of the date I need, when the month and day vary between 1 and 2 digits. Thanks for any help.