Error 484 NOTE 484-185: Format $COMMA was not found or could not be loaded.

[DME790]

Hi All,

I am getting an error when I try to format several results to comma9.

 Format Total_FY_Answered_Calls Comma9.;
                                           _______
                                           484
NOTE 484-185: Format $COMMA was not found or could not be loaded.

I'm not sure if the Prompts I have used are affecting the end result - they are set to

• Prompt Type: Numeric
• Allow only integer values

Data work.ASA_Forecast_Part_Calc_1;
	Set Work.ASA_Forecast_Part_sum;
	Additional_Calls = "&Total_Calls_1" - Calls_Answered_cnt;
	Total_FY_Answered_Calls = "&Total_Calls_1" ;
	Total_Add_TM = Additional_Calls * "&Total_Calls_1_ASA";
	Required_ASA = "&Total_Calls_1_ASA";
	ASA = (Total_Add_TM + TOTAL_ANSWER_TM) / Total_FY_Answered_Calls;

	Format Total_FY_Answered_Calls Comma9.;



RUN;

The current output looks like this

This is what I woukl like the numeric figures to be formatted as

Any help is appreciated.

Cheers

Dean

[Ksharp]

If I was right , variable Total_FY_Answered_Calls  is character type.
Check it by
 proc contents data=have; run;

[DME790]

Thanks Ksharp - I thought that was the case - Now for the silly question how do I change them to be numeric?

I will need to convert to numeric the following

1. Total_FY_Answered_Calls
2. Required_ASA

Thanks for your help in advance

[Ksharp]

use INPUT() then format it.

new=input(Total_FY_Answered_Calls , best32.);
format new comma.;

[DME790]

Thanks KSharp,

Tom's advice worked for me but will keep your code for future reference to help format output.

Cheers

Dean

[Tom · Accepted solution]

Did you notice the $ in the error message?  SAS has kindly tried to fix your attempt to attach the numeric format COMMA to the character variable Total_FY_Answered_Calls by looking for the character format $COMMA instead.  But it did not find any $COMMA format.

Assuming that your macro variables contain strings that look like numbers you should be able to fix this by just removing the quotes.

Additional_Calls = &Total_Calls_1 - Calls_Answered_cnt;
Total_FY_Answered_Calls = &Total_Calls_1 ;
Total_Add_TM = Additional_Calls * &Total_Calls_1_ASA;
Required_ASA = &Total_Calls_1_ASA;
ASA = (Total_Add_TM + TOTAL_ANSWER_TM) / Total_FY_Answered_Calls;
Format Total_FY_Answered_Calls Comma9.;

[DME790]

Thanks Tom,

That has done it for me - so simple when you know how.

Just to clarify as I have only used prompts for dates -

You use the quote marks if it is a date or text otherwise if the input is numeric leave the quotes out?

Cheers

Dean

[Tom]

Probably has more to do with how you are using the macro variables in the code than with the prompts themselves.

If you want to create a string literal then you need to have the value in quotes.  

name = 'Sally';
address = "123 West Front Street";

If the value of the string literal is coming from a macro variable then the quotes need to be double quote characters, otherwise the & trigger is treated as a normal character.

company = 'Ben&Jerry' ;
ceo = "&my_prompt_value" ;

SAS also support date literals (and other special literals) in a similar way.  In particular date literals use a quoted string follwed immediately by the letter D.  The string needs to be in DATE. format (ie ddMMMyy , dd-MMM-yyyy).

%let due_date_prompt = 15APR2017 ;
....
 days_left = "&due_date_prompt"d - date() ;