What is "Final Total", literal text that goes into the field of a record or is that the name of your field?
The error message should have nothing to do with using < or <>. It means that the data you are trying to input exceeds what the field can hold - in at least one record of the query. However, a SELECT query cannot append or update data so that makes no sense to me. Maybe you have an open query and you're trying to edit or append with it directly?
The more we hear silence, the more we begin to think about our value in this universe.
Paraphrase of Professor Brian Cox.