Thank you for the welcome. There is some great stuff on here :-)

Your solution works tigeravatar - much appreciated. It solves my immediate problem thank you. Was the problem with the original solution the array formula?

Now I just need to find a way to make your suggestion run as fast as an array formula! It takes quite some time on my core 2 duo machine to process 70,000 records against the list of 50 or so filters!

Paul