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Power Platform Community / Forums / Power Automate / Reading Excel Dates cr...
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Reading Excel Dates created by a formula

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Posted on by 2
Hello! 
 
I think this is a formula or excel sheet problem, rather than a Power Automate problem, but here goes: 
 
Some colleagues and I are trying to set up a flow which triggers an email to be sent 6 months post a certain date. We've managed to set up a flow which works on a very simple spreadsheet, however when we try to use it on the spreadsheet which needs to be our source data, it provides an error around processing DateTime to match the ISO 8601 format. 
 
 
The flow relies on a column in excel which calculates 182 days from a previous column, using the formula =IF((ISBLANK(T3)),"",T3+182) 
 
Using this formula in a sheet which purely has four columns (Name, Email, Date, 6 months post match date) and setting the flow to run from this sheet means the flow runs fine and sends the email we want it to. 
When I try to set this flow against a sheet which is much more complicated and has various inputs from MS Forms, the flow returns the error above with the inability to process the formatDateTime, even though it's been asked to look at a column which is performing the same function (calculate a date using another column which is a manually inputted date). In that column, it will run the flow for manually inputted dates, but not for the dates calculated by the formula. 
 
I'm about to spend some time deleting columns within a test spreadsheet to see if something in another column is affecting it. I've checked the regional settings of the source data sheet to check that's the right format, Any other ideas as to what may specifically be in this source spreadsheet that's causing the data to act differently? 
 
General flow setup: 
 
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  • Suggested answer
    rzaneti Profile Picture
    4,241 Super User 2025 Season 2 on at
     
    You just have to change the DateTime Format in your Excel action Advanced Parameters:
     
     
    Let me know if it works for you or if you need any additional help!
    If this solved your issue, please mark it as Accepted Answer.
    👍 If it helped, feel free to give it a like!

    🌐 Explore more Power Platform content on my Website or on my ▶️ YouTube
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  • NT-07051050-0 Profile Picture
    2 on at
    Hello! 
     
    Apologies it's taken a while to get back to you. 
     
    With this particular issue, I already had the Advanced Parameters set to ISO 8601 format. It turned out that the issue was caused by formatting in Excel, so I cleaned up the data in the sheet and that got it to work. 
     
    However, I'm still having problems with the flow working with this particular sheet. I can point the flow at a test sheet and have it work perfectly, but something within the sheet we're using is causing errors. 
     
    I'm struggling to test and work out what it is, but I'm wondering if it's something with the MS Forms connection to this sheet. 
     
    The sheet I'm using gets autopopulated from an MS Forms submission, then columns T onwards are our own added columns (not on the form) that we use to manage the programme. 
     
    It seems like new form submissions cause the flow to not work properly and throw up the same Date ISO error as previously
     
     
    New forms submissions also cause excel to pull a formula that's normally in column X into column V, causing a #REF error. 
     
    We use the MS Forms - MS Excel autosync, and I really can't work out what to adjust to stop this formula being pulled into the wrong column, or what seems to be causing the error. 
  • Suggested answer
    rzaneti Profile Picture
    4,241 Super User 2025 Season 2 on at
     
    In this case, it seems to be a format issue default from the synching between MS Forms and Excel. I don't remember to try, in the past, to read data from any synched from Forms, so I didn't experience this error before.
     
    If this is the case, here is a workaround for you: use the expression addDays('1899-12-30', int([excel date]), 'yyyy-MM-dd'). As the Serial number from Excel counts the qty of days that have been passed since Dec 30 1899, you can just use a function to add that qty of days to this date.
     
    For example, I have this table with sample data:
     
     
    And I'm reading it as Serial Number:
     
     
    And I'm then using a Select to fix the dates with the expression shared above:
     
    This is the output:
     
    Let me know if it works for you or if you need any additional help!
     
    If this solved your issue, please mark it as Accepted Answer.
    👍 If it helped, feel free to give it a like!

    🌐 Explore more Power Platform content on my Website or on my ▶️ YouTube
    💼 Find me on LinkedIn

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