Lawrence D'Oliveiro enlightened us with: > "select * from details where person_name like" > " concat(\"%%\", %s, \"%%\")" \ > % \ > QuoteSQL(name, True) Wouldn't this be a whole lot better? cursor.execute( "select * from details where person_name like ?", '%' + name + '%' ) Sybren -- Sybren Stüvel Stüvel IT - http://www.stuvel.eu/