title: Alter the precision of an existing decimal column in SQL Server 2014 results in error
body: <p>I have a couple decimal columns in a couple tables that I need to expand from <code>decimal(9, 4)</code> to <code>decimal(9, 5)</code>. Unfortunately I get the following error every way I try. So far I have tried changing it using design in SQL Server Management Studio and running the query:</p>
  
  <pre><code>alter table xxx 
  alter column xxx decimal (9,5) not null
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>The error is the same: </p>
  
  <blockquote>
    <p>Msg 8115, Level 16, State 8, Line 1<br>
    Arithmetic overflow error converting numeric to data type numeric.</p>
  </blockquote>
  
  <p>These are large, important tables that are used in dozens of stored procedures and applications so I want to avoid adding a new column and copying the data over. Each table has between 250K and 500K rows. </p>
  
  <p>Any ideas would be appreciated. 
  Thanks!</p>