Power Query Error - Duplicating Queries

[ash12486]

Hi All, 

I've been working with PQ for several years now, and this is the first time I'm having this issue.  I don't even have a lot to go on to even be able to ask a question, but I'll try to do my best.

Background info...

I have a PQ that I setup to help one of our departments audit data between two different system.  There are multiple tables on the workbook that are being used as queries, and it is also pulling excel files from local drives with other source data.  The user's job is to paste data into a table (based on which system's data they are auditing), and save a new copy of one of the source files, then refresh the query. 

Issue...

I cannot find a pattern of what could cause this... but one day it is working as expected, then the next the user gets an error message like the following...

I understand why it can't find "Audit Results" which is because the query structure has completed changed and it has seemingly created copies of all the queries.

First image is the orginial structure, and the second is how it looks after this issue happens. 

   

Does anyone have any idea what is causing this to happen?  TIA!

[ash12486 · Accepted solution]

Hi Jing, thank you for responding!  You are correct, I forgot to mention in my original post that everything was able to pretty quickly be fixed by removing the (#).  But the root issue was driving me crazy, because it was happening more and more frequently.

Upon further investigation, I believe I’ve identified the root cause of this issue. I wanted to share my findings in case anyone else encounters a similar problem.

During a walkthrough with the user, it became clear that they were copying audit results to another worksheet without pasting the data as values. Each time they did this, they inadvertently copied the query as well. Although we’ve only recently deleted those query copies, it seems quite plausible that this was the underlying reason for the recurring issue.

[v-jingzhan-msft]

Thank you for sharing your findings! 

[v-jingzhan-msft]

Hi @ash12486 

I've never had this issue either. This looks weird. Based on the number at the end of each query name, it seems that each query is not duplicated the same number of times. If these queries were only duplicated, removing the ending numbers in query names should bring everything back to work again. 

Best Regards,
Jing