Embedded VLOOKUP function within IF function

[beautyteknorth]

Please help!

=IF(VLOOKUP(F252,'YB Engineer planning'!G:H,2,FALSE)="Olivetti
Decommissioning",VLOOKUP(F252,'YB Engineer planning'!A:H,3,FALSE),"")

I am trying to lookup two lots of data - one is a filter - "Olivetti
Decommissioning" - then the site name is the second lookup provided the
work is "Olivetti Decommissioning".

The formula above works perfectly well for 95% of my data but for
reasons best known to someone else there are 5 lookup entries that
result in a blank cell (which is stated in the formula if there are no
entries for the site name and "Olivetti Decommissioning"). These 5
entries ARE available on the Engineer planning worksheet. Most of the
entries have more than one entry on the Engineer planning sheet but it
is just the five that are not getting a result. I know that the formula
is referencing properly because I get an #N/A if I change the names
slightly.

I have ensured that the lookup data is spelt the same. I cannot see
what the issue is? Any ideas? Thanks in advance!



Amanda

 

[Guest]

to debug this, I would use the match() function to see what line is being
found in both sections.
=match(F252,'YB Engineer planning'!G:G)
=match(F252,'YB Engineer planning'!A:A)
check over the appropriate number of columns and see what you get.

 

[beautyteknorth]

Hi bj,

I've tried this - there are multiple occurances of the same value in
the list and the list is unsorted so if I omit the match type the
function returns some random value and if I include the match type it
accurately returns the first instance of the value in the list.

I don't get why only 5 values are affected!!

Thanks for your help.

Amanda

 

[Dav]

try what bj said but use
=match(F252,'YB Engineer planning'!G:G,0)
=match(F252,'YB Engineer planning'!A:A,0)

to ensure exact matches.

Check for extra spaces after the text strings, they could be causing
you problems

Regards

Dav

 

[Guest]

thanks Dav, I knew better (or should have)

 

[beautyteknorth]

Hi guys,

Yep, tried all of this. Not solving the problems though. The text
strings are identical and the match function returns (correctly) only
the first entry when using the match type 0.

I'm stumped!

 

[Dav]

If you are using a match type 0, which is the same as your vlookup in
essence it will always return the first match.

You maybe have to restate your problem giving an example and showing
what you want exactly as the solution. In your example

=IF(VLOOKUP(F252,'YB Engineer planning'!G:H,2,FALSE)="Olivetti
Decommissioning",VLOOKUP(F252,'YB Engineer planning'!A:H,3,FALSE),"")

If the first match of f252 in columnG has olivetti Decommissioning next
to it you are then saying rematch this value in f252 in columnA and
return the value in column c next to it.

If column A is different to column G you will not be returning the same
row

What exactly do you want to achieve?

Regards

Dav