Error in file.exists

General
1

I have a code that says

filename <- 09102020
filename_empty <- e09102020

if (file.exists(paste(dirname,filename_empty,sep ="")))
{
message("Empty file today")
} else if (file.exists(paste(dirname,filename,sep="")))
{
filename
}

It isn't actually producing anything. It's not producing the message and it isn't producing the message, nor is it producing the filename.

2

Is e09102020 supposed to be a character string? If so it needs quotes around it, as does 09102020