Anon OpinTelephone numbers are not numbers. If a leading 0 is an important part of an identifier then it's different to its numerical value and so not a number.
Gary 
David Cantrell 🏏@WiteWulf @anon_opin but some do. For example, in Italy all geographic numbers start with a zero. Therefore they are not numbers. You also can't do meaningful arithmetic on them. Anyone attempting to store phone "numbers" in a numeric field is an idiot and should have their computer licence revoked.
Sabrina 🇺🇦🇹🇼🏳️🌈🏳️⚧️@anon_opin @WiteWulf @DrHyde The problem is that often spreadsheets (eg: Excel) *assumes* it’s a number and treats it as such. 😖 It’s not always the user’s fault.
@lds @anon_opin @WiteWulf given that you can't do meaningful arithmetic on phone "numbers", putting them into Excel is an error. But if you do put it in there it takes but a moment of How To Use Excel training to learn about data types. I suppose it might not be the user's fault - if they've had no training for example - but then it's the fault of the negligent twit who chose Excel for the task and there's still a computer licence that should be revoked and a job that should be lost.
Supermoosie@DrHyde @lds @anon_opin @WiteWulf
Yet you can put phone numbers and part numbers starting with zeros into excel.
And yes excel can be used as a database.