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rebecca's avatar
rebecca
Copper Contributor
Jun 11, 2018

How to sum dollar amounts

Hello,

How do I sum only the dollar amounts in a column that also contain text and other number values, such as percentages?

 

Example column as follows:  (my report has many columns and I would like to obtain the total dollar amount for each column)

 

5/26 - 6/8
wk 3 & 4
14.2%
$32,947.43
100341
5-25-18
wk 1 & 2
22.5%
$5,860.35
100351
5-31-18
wk 4 & 5
22.5%
$31,843.24
100322
5-17-18
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
last day 5-29
100%
$35,387.50
100300
4-30-18
 
 
 
 
 
wk 3 & 4
100%
$40,915
100342
5-25-18
 
 
 
 
 
wk 12 & 13
92.9%
 
 
 

 

  • Hello,

    as a human being, how do you identify the numbers you want to include in the sum? Is there a pattern? How would you describe the logic in words? You need to give Excel something logical, some rules to work out which number to sum. The $ sign in front of the number can possibly work.

     

    The Cell() function can identify certain formats. If a number is formatted with an accounting or a currency format, the formula CELL("format",A1) will return the letter C, followed by the number of decimals of the format, i.e. C2 for a number formatted with 2 decimals. Other letters returned could be P for percentage or G for General.

     

    You could try using a helper column with the Cell formula cited above, but extracting only the first character.  =LEFT(CELL("format",B1),1)

     

    Then run a Sumif() to sum only the cells in the values column where the helper column has a "C".

     

    Note that if you change the format of a cell, you will need to recalculate the cell manually for the Cell function to update.

     

    Does that help?

     

     

     

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