I am working with a spreadsheet which I am able to convert over to a table in access.

The challenges lies in the fact that the user of the spreadsheet inserted additional information for just some of the existing records. i.e the original order called for the sale of 1000 units.

In each case some or all of the units were shipped.

Assuming that record #500 showed that 1000 units were shipped
on the 15th of july, 200 units were shipped. This information was extended out and added to the record.
on the 20th of July, 600 units were shipped. This information was also etended out on the same record.
on the 25th of July, the remaining 200 units were shipped.

A column in this same record maintains a running balance.

The task that I have is to convert this to an access table. I had no problem importing the data into a table.
The problem lies in the importation of the many to one fields so that they match with the original records.

A field called Contract # is the key field.

I guess that the question that I have is _ should this be done with an append or an update query.

It seems that if I use an append query, there is a tendency to multiply (or duplicate) the records..

Edited by: george830 on Sun Dec 6 11:17:44 EST 2009.

So the data looks like this, then?

Contract # ..............DateShipped1...AmountShipped1...DateShipped2...AmountShipped2...et
c.

Is that correctl?

If that is so, then an Make-Table query that appends the Contract #, DateShipped1, AmountShipped1 values from the imported table. Then change the structure of the new table so that DateShipped1 becomes DateShipped and AmountShipped1 becomes Amount Shipped. You would place a criteria in the Append Query to only import those from the rows where there are actual values. Then use Append queries to copy the DateShipped2, AmountShipped2, etc. values from the imported to the new table's DateShipped and AmountShipped values.

Edited by: fkegley on Mon Dec 7 10:12:50 EST 2009.