OK ALL YOU COBOL GURUS, PLEASE REFRESH MY MEMORY. .....WORKING-STORAGE SECTION. 01 NEXT-YRSEM PIC 9(3). ....down in PROCEDURE DIVISION...... IF NEXT-YRSEM = "Y" ................. This is a definite bug in the particular system. How come the Native Mode compiler did not throw this out as an ILLEGAL COMPARE or similar? We are on 5.0. Thanks Tim Hoefner [log in to unmask]