Date formatted as general makes false statement

I have inherited a large project that is causing me a problem with the new year causing the false statements in if statements. Thank you in advance for your expert knowledge. I am using excel 2003 and these formulas are written for numbers when in reality the number represents dates. so the formulas are correct but wrong if you are using them as a date.

Column A has 123110 meaning (12/31/2010)
Column B has 10311 meaning (1/3/2011)
Column C has =IF(f2>0,f2,g2)
Column D has =IF(c2>b2,"L",IF(c2<a2,"E"))
Column F & G both have 123110 meaning (12/31/2010)

The result in column D is L which is correct if reading as numbers but as dates it should result in an E.

I have attached a sample.
Thank you
Michelle