# Google Sheets problem

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/google-sheets-problem/814269>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [May 16, 2018, 7:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/google-sheets-problem/814269 "2018-05-16T07:26:22Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Shinna\_Minna\_Ma](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f08c70/32.png) [@Shinna\_Minna\_Ma](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shinna_Minna_Ma)\
**Post date:** [May 16, 2018, 7:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/google-sheets-problem/814269/1 "2018-05-16T07:26:22Z")

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I was addied up a column of numbers in Google sheets, and sent the result to my boss. He emailed me back, saying the total was wrong. I double and triple checked, and my boss was correct. The sum function was skipping one of the cells (B692) in the middle of the column.

I checked the column next to it, and the same thing happened. The sum function skipped C692.

If I used the sum function to add the two cells across (B692 + C692), the answer was 0.

Any idea what the cause would be for this? The cell, row, and column don’t seem to be formatted any differently than any of the other cells, rows, and columns.

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**Author:** ![Reply](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/reply/32/15952_2.png) [@Reply](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Reply)\
**Post date:** [May 16, 2018, 7:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/google-sheets-problem/814269/2 "2018-05-16T07:32:19Z")

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Try selecting that entire column and then clicking on Format -\> Number -\> Number. Does that help?

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Shinna\_Minna\_Ma](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f08c70/32.png) [@Shinna\_Minna\_Ma](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shinna_Minna_Ma)\
**Post date:** [May 16, 2018, 7:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/google-sheets-problem/814269/3 "2018-05-16T07:38:24Z")

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> [@Reply](#):
>
> Try selecting that entire column and then clicking on Format -\> Number -\> Number. Does that help?

Yes, it did. Thank you!

I still don’t know how two cells were formatted differently than the rest of the sheet. Someone else must have gone in and fooled around with the formatting.

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**Author:** ![Reply](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/reply/32/15952_2.png) [@Reply](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Reply)\
**Post date:** [May 16, 2018, 9:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/google-sheets-problem/814269/4 "2018-05-16T09:01:06Z")

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Yeah, or maybe it was an import problem. Stray characters (random spaces, punctuation, formatting marks, other languages, etc.) can really eff things up… it’s finicky

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**Author:** ![ftg](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ftg/32/2801_2.png) [@ftg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ftg)\
**Post date:** [May 16, 2018, 2:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/google-sheets-problem/814269/5 "2018-05-16T14:32:44Z")

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> [@Reply](#):
>
> Try selecting that entire column and then clicking on Format -\> Number -\> Number. Does that help?

This was my first thought as well. When is a number not a number? When it’s a string or some such in a cell.