Answered

Possible DateTime field formatting issue between SharePoint and Power Automate flow

(0) Share

Report

Posted on by mitchellrenner

This is a SharePoint list / Power Automate question.

Have a SharePoint list with datetime field (date and time). When this field is updated by a Power Automate flow (using utcNow), it registers in the SharePoint list's Version History as a modification.

However the next time I edit the same record manually in SharePoint and change some other field, that datetime field registers as being modified again ... even though I didn't even touch it. This is causing problems with additional Power Automate flow functionality that keys off that field changing.

Any idea WHY the SharePoint list datetime field would register as changing the second time even though the field wasn't even touched by anything? See image - the datetime value is exactly the same in the later version history! Is there some Power Automate utcNow date format issue that SharePoint is then reformatting the next time the record saves in SharePoint?

Categories:

General topics

All responses (2)

Answers (1)

Sort by

mitchellrenner 32 on at

Like
a
(0)

Report
Copy link

Link copied!

Another data point - if I then modify the SharePoint list item manually again, the datetime field does not register a modification again.
Verified answer

mitchellrenner 32 on at

Like
a
(0)

Report
Copy link

Link copied!

It believe SharePoint is changing the value from

what utcNow is populating in the Power Automate flow
2024-03-29T20:51:43.9174956Z

what SharePoint is modifying it to the next time record is saved
2024-03-29T20:51:43Z

I will look for a way in the initial flow that populates the date field to get rid of the extra decimals from utcNow

Formula that worked in flow:
formatDateTime(utcNow(), 'MM/dd/yyyy hh:mm tt')

Had to exclude seconds also because SharePoint would change the value to :00 seconds when modifying the record. This formula effectively prevents a utcNow populated date field from changing again.