Excel wont Paste Special wont paste formulas it says Unicode text

[Stephen Karanja]

I recently had a problem with Excel on my work computer where it didn
want to paste special. It would only paste the values and when ever
tried to use "paste special", I got a message about "unicode text" o
"text".

After hours of trying to figure it out, I called the IT guy and h
figured it out.

It was the SKYPE to CALL function that I had installed on my machin
when I was installing skype the week before.

He un-installed that function by going to the control panel and removin
the skype to call funtion but he did not remove all of skype b/c he sai
the auto calling function was the issue NOT the whole skype program.

After restarting the machine, excel was restored to its origina
functionality.

I just thought this might be helpful to somebody somewhere.

Thanks

Stephen

 

[tedrobert]

Thanks for your post, Stephen.

I recently encountered the same problem, wondering what happened and wh
I no longer had paste options, just this "Unicode text" window.

I found your post on a Google search. I too had recently installed th
Skype Click to Call function.

So I uninstalled that program, restarted the computer, and the past
function worked again.

Weird...

 

[OMTucker]

Had the exact same problem, and by removing Skype to Call fixed m
problem too. These posts saved me a ton a time.

 

[stowbury]

Yes, that is incredibly useful. I had exactly the same problem and i
was driving me round the bend. And it was not only paste special that i
messes up, you can't copy rows and insert them, or copy highlighte
groups of cells. Fortunately I only spent half an hour trying to figur
out what was going on before googling and finding this post which hit
the nail on the head. I removed Skype click to call as well and thing
are back to normal.

Thanks for saving the day

 

[BigHowie]

A Huge Thanks for this tip Stephen.

I was working on an important worksheet, had a Skype call to make, an
updated my skype application which was seriously out of date (well, wh
not?). Went back to finishing off the spreadsheet later in the day an
the behaviour was truly bizarre. I messed up quite a few cells before
realized something was SERIOUSLY wrong. Spent two hours trying to mak
Excel behave. How can a person associate Excel problems with som
totally non related application. I have worked in the IT industry fo
30 years and have seen my share of crazy bugs but this one deserves
prize. The fact that Skype is a Microsoft company makes allowing such
fault in this software raise real questions about Microsoft qualit
control proceedures.
Anyhow for anyone seeing this bug let me clarify the fix:
1) go to Control Panel
2) Select show/delete softward choice
3) You will see two Skype applications
4) Delete the one saying Skype click to call

Problem fixed
Howi

 

[monkeypeach]

Thanks .... It worked ... :-

 

[phyllis]

OMTucker wrote on 04/20/2012 16:56 ET

Had the exact same problem, and by removing Skype to Call fixed
problem too. These posts saved me a ton a time

tedrobert;1600726 Wrote
OMTucke

Hi, i also face the same problem, removing Skype to Call fixed ? meaning i nee
to uninstall the skype software?

 

[jonathanbryan80]

THANK YOU so much for posting this - I have been trying to work this problem out for about 2 months (I am not in IT but work with excel and Skype all the time).

You have saved me so much time!

Jonathan