External Tables....HELP!!!!

Ok, I created a simple external table:

CREATE TABLE allstar_ratings_ext (

   RATE_DATE VARCHAR2(8),
   ANALYST_ID NUMBER(7),
   INDUSTRY_ID NUMBER(5),
   INDUSTRY_RATING NUMBER(15))
Organization external
(type oracle_loader
default directory indata_directory
access parameters (records delimited by newline fields terminated by ',')
location ('allstar_ratings.txt'))
reject limit 1000;

However, not matter what I select fom that table, I get the following error:

error processing column INDUSTRY_RATING in row 1 for datafile /u01/ NI00/prod/data/indata/allstar_ratings.txt ORA-01722: invalid number

When I look at the log, I see this:

  Fields in Data Source:

    RATE_DATE                       CHAR (255)
      Terminated by ","
      Trim whitespace same as SQL Loader
    ANALYST_ID                      CHAR (255)
      Terminated by ","
      Trim whitespace same as SQL Loader
    INDUSTRY_ID                     CHAR (255)
      Terminated by ","
      Trim whitespace same as SQL Loader
    INDUSTRY_RATING                 CHAR (255)
      Terminated by ","
      Trim whitespace same as SQL Loader

Excuse me??? I did not define anything as CHAR(255). I explicitly defined my datatypes. The data is simple and looks like this:

1-Jan-07,10933,3,-20.543

So, what gives here? I've been all over looking for help on this.

Thanks for any help given. Received on Wed Nov 21 2007 - 22:42:24 CST