Month and day are not displayed in the order that you expect in a mail merge document linked to an external data source in Word 2002 (327579)


The information in this article applies to:

  • Microsoft Word 2002
This article was previously published under Q327579

SYMPTOMS

When you use Word 2002 to create a mail merge document that is linked to a data source that contains dates, the values of the date fields in the document may display the incorrect date. Specifically, the day and the month may be switched.

CAUSE

This problem occurs when all the following conditions are true:
  • You have attached the data source to the document by means of OLE DB.
  • Your system date format is not MM/DD/YYYY or MM/DD/YY.
  • The relevant date values are ambiguous where the day and month values are concerned. For example, the day value is less than or equal to 12. This occurs whether or not a formatting switch has been applied to the date mail merge field in the mail merge document.
  • You have applied a formatting switch to the date mail merge field in the mail merge document.

RESOLUTION

Service Pack Information

This problem is corrected in Office XP Service Pack 3. To resolve this problem, obtain the latest service pack for Microsoft Office XP. For additional information, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

307841 How to obtain the latest Office XP service pack

Hotfix Information

A supported hotfix is now available from Microsoft, but it is only intended to correct the problem that is described in this article. Only apply it to systems that are experiencing this specific problem. This hotfix may receive additional testing. Therefore, if you are not severely affected by this problem, Microsoft recommends that you wait for the next Microsoft Office XP Service Pack that contains this hotfix.

To resolve this problem immediately, contact Microsoft Product Support Services to obtain the hotfix. For a complete list of Microsoft Product Support Services telephone numbers and information about support costs, visit the following Microsoft Web site:

http://support.microsoft.com/contactus/?ws=support

Note In special cases, charges that are ordinarily incurred for support calls may be canceled if a Microsoft Support Professional determines that a specific update will resolve your problem. The usual support costs will apply to additional support questions and issues that do not qualify for the specific update in question.
The English version of this fix has the file attributes (or later) that are listed in the following table. The dates and times for these files are listed in coordinated universal time (UTC). When you view the file information, it is converted to local time. To find the difference between UTC and local time, use the Time Zone tab in the Date and Time tool in Control Panel. 
   Date         Time    Size       File name     
   -----------------------------------------------
   24-Jan-2003  18:39   5,676,428  Winword.msp
   24-Jan-2003  19:21   6,629,784  Winwordff.msp
After the hotfix is installed, the following files will have the listed attributes or later:
   Date         Time   Version      Size        File name     
   --------------------------------------------------------
   24-Jan-2003  02:05  10.0.4921.0  10,598,984  Winword.exe

STATUS

Microsoft has confirmed that this is a problem in the Microsoft products that are listed at the beginning of this article. This problem was first corrected in Office XP Service Pack 3.

MORE INFORMATION

With the hotfix installed, you must still insert the desired date/time picture switch in the DATE mergefield. Such as {MERGEFIELD Date \@ "dd.MM.YYYY"} or {MERGEFIELD Date \@ "d.MMM.YYYY"}.
Modification Type:MajorLast Reviewed:4/7/2006
Keywords:kbQFE KBHotfixServer kbbug kbfix KB327579
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