# .txt files



## gmorell (Apr 2, 2014)

Hello from one of your newest members.
As a non-skilled computer type with my new iMac I must learn to submit 
invoices in a .txt file format. Is there a way to do this using Excel, as the only save option 
that I saw which did not work was the .csv format. This was not accepted!
Thank you very much for any advice.


----------



## krs (Mar 18, 2005)

Hi,

Welcome to ehMac!

I'm not sure what the problem is, .txt shows up as one of the many possible file formats that one can save an Excel file as.


----------



## gmorell (Apr 2, 2014)

*.txt file*

Thank you for the response from "krs". I forgot to mention in my origiinal post that I must submit the .txt file with comma separarted values, not tab delimited. This is where I stalled in my attempt to save the Excel file.
Any ideas? Thank You


----------



## John Clay (Jun 25, 2006)

gmorell said:


> Thank you for the response from "krs". I forgot to mention in my origiinal post that I must submit the .txt file with comma separarted values, not tab delimited. This is where I stalled in my attempt to save the Excel file.
> Any ideas? Thank You


That's an odd request, as a CSV file is a comma separated text file. I would suggest saving as a CSV, then renaming it to .txt to see if you can get around this silly requirement.


----------



## pm-r (May 17, 2009)

As JC says, a bit of an odd request.

If the Excel "invoice" is displaying as a normal invoice would, why not just save it a .pdf file and send that to them.

Then they could just print it if needed if they want a "text" type invoice as all "text" would be included. And I'd suggest it could look a lot more professional as well.

I believe that there are free Excel invoice type templates available as well if so needed.


----------



## krs (Mar 18, 2005)

pm-r,

I assume the recipient wants a format that is compatible with their existing payment system so that invoices and payments are pretty automated and easy to track.
If that is the case, the basic issue may be that their system is ancient - maybe even DOS based.
I'm always amazed how many companies still use "ancient" software, probably too expensive to rewrite anything that was custom made.

I think JC's suggestion is a very good one - if that doesn't work I would try some of the other .txt options available in the Excel drop-down or find out from the recipient what they really want.
Like maybe MS-DOS or Windows csv text files although I have no clue how these differ from regular .csv files


----------

