diff --git a/CHANGELOG.md b/CHANGELOG.md
index dc02ac4cd..cf41f2587 100644
--- a/CHANGELOG.md
+++ b/CHANGELOG.md
@@ -17,6 +17,7 @@ and [PEP 440](https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0440/).
 - `fpdf.FPDF()` constructor now accepts ints or floats as a unit, and raises a `ValueError` if an invalid unit is provided.
 
 ### Fixed
+- `Template.parse_csv`: preserving numeric values when using CSV based templates - [#205](https://github.com/PyFPDF/fpdf2/pull/205)
 - the code snippet to generate Code 39 barcodes in the documentation was missing the start & end `*` characters.
 This has been fixed, and a warning is now triggered by the [`FPDF.code39`](https://pyfpdf.github.io/fpdf2/fpdf/fpdf.html#fpdf.fpdf.FPDF.code39) method when those characters are missing.
 
diff --git a/fpdf/util.py b/fpdf/util.py
index e48778641..135cca9b2 100644
--- a/fpdf/util.py
+++ b/fpdf/util.py
@@ -1,14 +1,15 @@
 import locale
 from typing import Union, Iterable
 
-try_to_type_known_types = [
+_TRY_TO_TYPE_KNOWN_TYPES = (
     int,
     float,
-]
+)
 
 
 def try_to_type(value):
-    for known_type in try_to_type_known_types:
+    "Try to convert a string into a number"
+    for known_type in _TRY_TO_TYPE_KNOWN_TYPES:
         try:
             return known_type(value)
         except ValueError:
diff --git a/test/template/test_template.py b/test/template/test_template.py
index 2298e415c..cf80b47d3 100644
--- a/test/template/test_template.py
+++ b/test/template/test_template.py
@@ -134,13 +134,11 @@ def test_template_nominal_csv(tmp_path):
     tmpl = Template(format="A4", title="Sample Invoice")
     tmpl.parse_csv(HERE / "mycsvfile.csv", delimiter=";")
     tmpl.add_page()
-    tmpl.render()
-    assert_pdf_equal(tmpl.pdf, HERE / "template_nominal_csv.pdf", tmp_path)
+    assert_pdf_equal(tmpl, HERE / "template_nominal_csv.pdf", tmp_path)
     tmpl = Template(format="A4", title="Sample Invoice")
     tmpl.parse_csv(HERE / "mycsvfile.csv", delimiter=";", encoding="utf-8")
     tmpl.add_page()
-    tmpl.render()
-    assert_pdf_equal(tmpl.pdf, HERE / "template_nominal_csv.pdf", tmp_path)
+    assert_pdf_equal(tmpl, HERE / "template_nominal_csv.pdf", tmp_path)
 
 
 def test_template_code39(tmp_path):  # issue-161