Confusing results

[Papa Jonah]

In cells H15 and H36 I have 10/31/09 and 1/31/10 respectively.
In J 15 and J36 I have the following formula:

=DATE(YEAR(H15),MONTH(H15-DAY(H15))+2,)
Cell J36 has With H36 instead of H15.
The intent is to identify the last date of the month identified in column H.

However, the results are:
H J
10/31/09 10/31/09 (This worked)
1/31/10 1/31/11 (This added a whole year)

The equation seems to work every where unless the date in column H is in
January.

Column L does something similar to calculate the end of the subsequent
month. It works in all cases. The formula I used for that is:
=DATE(YEAR(H36),MONTH(H36-DAY(H36)+2)+2,)

Why isn't the first formula working in every case?

TIA

Papa J

 

[Eduardo]

Hi,
If your data is exactly the same as posted your formula added a year because
in column H you have 1/31/10 and in column J 1/31/11 just a year so formula
works

 

[Papa Jonah]

But as I indicated, the intent is to identify the last day of the month - the
intent is not to add a year. The rest of the cells did not add a year making
all the other cells with the desired results as opposed to this one example
from January.

 

[David Biddulph]

If H15 is 31/1/10, MONTH will return 12, you've then added 2 to make it 14,
hence 31/1/11 sounds like the answer you would expect from that formula.

I'm not sure why you are using =DATE(YEAR(H15),MONTH(H15-DAY(H15))+2,)
Why not =DATE(YEAR(H15),MONTH(H15)+1,0) ?

 

[Ron Rosenfeld]

In cells H15 and H36 I have 10/31/09 and 1/31/10 respectively.
In J 15 and J36 I have the following formula:

=DATE(YEAR(H15),MONTH(H15-DAY(H15))+2,)
Cell J36 has With H36 instead of H15.
The intent is to identify the last date of the month identified in column H.

However, the results are:
H J
10/31/09 10/31/09 (This worked)
1/31/10 1/31/11 (This added a whole year)

The equation seems to work every where unless the date in column H is in
January.

Column L does something similar to calculate the end of the subsequent
month. It works in all cases. The formula I used for that is:
=DATE(YEAR(H36),MONTH(H36-DAY(H36)+2)+2,)

Why isn't the first formula working in every case?

TIA

Papa J

To return the last day of the month, with a date in H15

=date(year(h15),month(h15)+1,0)

or, if you have Excel 2007+ or an earlier version with the Analysis Tool Pak
installed:

=eomonth(h15,0)


--ron

 

[Papa Jonah]

Thanks David. I don't understand your explanation why I should get what I
got - especially since the other cells did not add a year.
But your suggestion worked beautifully. The reason I didn't do that before
is I didn't figure it out!

Thanks