Hi Mariano, Thank you for your prompt reply and sorry for the delay in my answering. I had already tried your suggestion but when I use another variable, the answer is always Pending that is, it's as if all entries are null. Don't know if this is happening due to the fact that the original variable "MainTesting" is being populated from a subreport. The only way I could make it work is to put $V{MainTesting}!=null ?"Ready" :"Pending" in a text field evalutaion time "Band" but then the problme is to use that field in another variable. Thank you once again for your help.