The purpose of this keyword is to create an exception key. EXCEPTION assigns a decimal ASCII value to a key; the key becomes a termination key that also causes an exception condition. The assigned value is returned in the EXCEPTION clause or the CONTROL KEY clause of the ACCEPT statement. See the TERMINATE keyword below if you want to terminate input without causing an exception condition. Note that ACUCOBOL-GT inhibits exception keys when no EXCEPTION or CONTROL KEY clause is present in the ACCEPT statement, unless the program was compiled with the -Vx option.