I checked all the above, and they were already set as you suggested. The only way I have discovered in getting Excel to recognise my input as a date is to set my own custom format. However, sometimes Excel wants to change the day and month around like American format - how do I stop this?

I also notice when I go to the date formats that the location is set to Dutch (Belgium). How can I set the default to English (New Zealand)? I don't want to be changing this every time.....