SQL Server Compare to NULL

Question

I have a lot of comparisons that I need to make between a value and its previous value.

For Example: ReceivedBy and PreviousReceivedBy.

I started with:

WHERE ReceivedBy != PreviousReceivedBy

But if either value is null then this returns false, (when I really need it to be true). So I updated it to look like this:

WHERE ReceivedBy != PreviousReceivedBy
      OR (ReceivedBy IS NULL AND PreviousReceivedBy IS NOT NULL)
      OR (ReceivedBy IS NOT NULL AND PreviousReceivedBy IS NULL)

This works fine, but I have a large list of fields that need to be compared. I would like to find a way to make this comparison with less code (without turning off ANSI_NULLS).

Obviously if there is no other way, then I will just put in all 3 lines for the comparison.

UPDATE:

As an example, here is what I am hoping for

ReceivedBy = 123  
PreviousReceivedBy = 123  
Result = FALSE  

ReceivedBy = 5  
PreviousReceivedBy = 123  
Result = TRUE  

ReceivedBy = NULL  
PreviousReceivedBy = 123  
Result = TRUE

ReceivedBy = 123  
PreviousReceivedBy = NULL  
Result = TRUE  

ReceivedBy = NULL  
PreviousReceivedBy = NULL  
Result = FALSE  

Answer 1

If both columns are varchars, I'd go with something like this:

coalesce(ReceivedBy, 'NULL') != coalesce(PreviousReceivedBy, 'NULL')

If they are integers, I'd put some values greatly below zero (to distinctly represent null value) instead of 'NULL'.

From names of columns I assume it has to be wether string value or integer value :)

UPDATE

As @Siyual pointed out, replacement string should be "out of the realm of possibility", you should replace 'NULL' above with some non-alphabetical character, as '#' :)