FOUND THE PROBLEM!!!

This was a good one. The cursor_sharing parameter were different on the two servers (production = 'similar' and test = 'exact').

There is an Oracle bug (Metalink 241464.1) that will cause formatting issue if the cursor_sharing parameter is set to 'similar'.... see below....

Thanks for your help and I hope this thread helps someone else.....


CAUSE DETERMINATION
====================
CURSOR_SHARING = SIMILAR or CURSOR_SHARING = FORCE parameter setting is causing this sqlplus formatting problem. Some code changes in 9203 patchset causes this parameter to mess up SQL*Plus formatting.

CAUSE JUSTIFICATION
====================
Note 241464.1 - TO_CHAR() , SUBSTR() AND RPAD() in SQL*Plus Display Length Too Long After Upgrading Database Version

POTENTIAL SOLUTION(S)
======================

alter session set optimizer_mode=choose;
alter session set cursor_sharing=exact;

POTENTIAL SOLUTION JUSTIFICATION(S)
====================================

Note 241464.1 - TO_CHAR() , SUBSTR() AND RPAD() in SQL*Plus Display Length Too Long After Upgrading Database Version