Automatically Extract Adobe Forms Data to Excel

[FitIQ_Steven]

Hi Everyone - Please Help!

I am new to power automate and have been going around in circles for hours. I have set up an automated flow to save my Adobe Forms PDf into a Sharepoint folder.

I am now trying to set up a flow to extract the data from each new PDF form that arrives in this folder. I can build the flow, but every time I run it, the flow says it worked, but no data appears in the Excel file. It is driving me crazy, I have tried multiple add-ins but they all yield the same result. The flow runs, but no data is added to the file.

I have found the "convert to Excel" Adobe add-in. But I am confused as to the setup. It is asking for the File Name of the source file with an extension - but the source file will change every time surely? That is the whole premise of this flow. And it also asks for "file content", I am again not sure what I should be putting in here.

Is there anyone out there who can help a struggling beginner?

[Andrew_J]

@FitIQ_Steven 

A question are all the PDF files you want to extract data from have the data in the same place, like an invoice number or address etc.

Andrew

[FitIQ_Steven]

Hi Yes,

It is a pre-exercise questionnaire for clients. I have attached a copy of it for you to see.

[Andrew_J]

@FitIQ_Steven 

Then I would look at AI.  As long as you have forms that have been completed using typed text and you have over 20 you can use for the training of AI then it is a simple case so I understand of selecting the area of the form, adding a tag, then alowing AI to record the data. 

Once it has done its learning then you can add hundreds of forms into the system and it should populate the data you need into a SharePoint List. 

There are a lot of YouTube clips on this expaining how to do it, but I will say I have never done it myself.  I reckon in a couple of hours or less you might have some data in a SharePoint List to use.

I hope that helps.

Andrew - UK

[AlexEncodian]

@FitIQ_Steven 

It will help you greatly with future flow builds to do some background readings on Power Automate basics. For example, the trigger when a file is created just triggers the flow. You need get the actual file to pass onto follow-on connectors such as Encodian or Adobe.

Have a look at this:

Working with the 'File Contents' Parameter

Regarding the form extraction, is this a PDF form that is filled out at a computer? The attachment doesn't appear to have form fields on it. Or is this filled out by hand and then scanned?

[FitIQ_Steven]

Hi,

Thank you for the link, it is an Adobe web form, the attached file was just an example. It is filled out via a link sent to the participants. Then once completed, the file saves to a SharePoint folder. 

[AlexEncodian]

@FitIQ_Steven 

In that case, you can quite easily extract form data using Encodian's Get PDF Form Data action. Here's an example step-by-step guide that adds the data to a SharePoint list...you have the same use case just adding it to Excel instead:

Extracting PDF form data using Power Automate | Encodian Blog