diff --git a/src/helper_functions.cpp b/src/helper_functions.cpp
index 0ad61ba4b..7770ce89d 100644
--- a/src/helper_functions.cpp
+++ b/src/helper_functions.cpp
@@ -514,7 +514,7 @@ void wide_to_long(
 
       int8_t vtyp = (int8_t)vtyps[i];
       // if colname is provided, the first row is always a character
-      if (ColNames & (j == 0)) vtyp = character;
+      if (ColNames && (j == 0)) vtyp = character;
       std::string vals = Rcpp::as<std::string>(cvec[j]);
       std::string row = std::to_string(startrow);
 
@@ -551,7 +551,7 @@ void wide_to_long(
       case character:
 
         // test if string can be written as number
-        if (string_nums && is_double(vals)) {
+        if (!(ColNames && (j == 0)) && string_nums && is_double(vals)) {
           cell.v   = vals;
           if (string_nums == 1) {
             vtyp = string_num;
diff --git a/tests/testthat/test-tables.R b/tests/testthat/test-tables.R
index 07f57bc3e..75b244f8d 100644
--- a/tests/testthat/test-tables.R
+++ b/tests/testthat/test-tables.R
@@ -203,3 +203,23 @@ test_that("updating table works", {
   expect_equal(got, "A1:J4")
 
 })
+
+test_that("writing table with factor titles works", {
+  df <- data.frame(
+    fct = structure(
+      1:2,
+      levels = c(
+        "one",
+        "two"
+      ),
+      class = "factor"),
+    `1` = 1:2,
+    check.names = F
+  )
+
+  wb <- wb_workbook()$add_worksheet()$add_data_table(x = df)
+
+  exp <- "<is><t>1</t></is>"
+  got <- wb$worksheets[[1]]$sheet_data$cc$is[[2]]
+  expect_equal(exp, got)
+})