Excel & data
Power Query: Cleaning Data Without Copy and Paste
Power Query records every cleaning step once and repeats it on the next refresh, so monthly clean-up stops being a manual job.
The monthly clean-up
Many teams spend hours each month downloading an export, deleting columns, fixing dates and pasting the result into a master sheet. The work is repetitive, and every manual step can introduce an error.
What Power Query does
Microsoft describes Power Query, called Get and Transform in Excel, as a way to import or connect to external data and shape it. It works in four stages: connect to the data, transform it, combine it with other sources, and load the result into a worksheet or data model. Each transformation is recorded as a step that you can review or edit, and the original source stays unchanged. When new data arrives, you refresh and the same steps run again.
Where it is available
Power Query is available in Excel for Windows, Excel for Mac and Excel for the web. It began as a free add-in for Excel 2010 on Windows and later became the main import tool in Microsoft 365. Requirements differ by version, so check the documentation for your setup.
When to use something bigger
Power Query handles the shape of the data very well. When data must be entered by several people at once, or when business rules become complex, a small database with a simple screen is the better foundation. MayTech Labs builds both kinds of solution, starting with the lightest one that does the job.
