All, I have resolved this issue. I changed the triggers to read only fast forward and all seems to be fine. thanks for the responses!

The thing is, I only need to run this script once, maybe twice and that's it! I'd rather fix what I have, run it then ditch it forever! Any ideas...

Sorry, what I meant was. can I learn FOR XML and re-create the above processing in 2 days. I realise cursors would no longer apply.

But, having said all of this,...

I take it I can't learn FOR XML EXPLICIT in 2 days and then write the above nested cursor in FOR XML format?!

I have inherited this script, it was written by a third party supplier, thats why the xml is generated manually. The problem is it didn't do what I needed so...