Nested Update Item in SharePoint not working

[elbent]

I have a cloud flow that runs whenever a new Form is submitted. It creates a SharePoint list item and then runs through approvals. After each approval, I want to update a field in the SharePoint item to show that person has approved it. 

Here's where I'm having an issue. Whenever I try to update the item, it forces me to add in "Apply to each" controls because there are two fields in the SharePoint item that can have multiple items inside.

These fields are not required for every response, however. So if a responder does not check anything for that question, the apply to each will not run, and the item will not get updated properly.

A related question: when you use the Update Item action, if you leave a field blank (for example, if I left the "Peripherals needed" field blank in the above action), would it set that field to blank in the SharePoint list, or leave it as it was before? That would solve my problem if I could just leave those fields blank, but it seems like you need to have all the fields filled out or it will erase them.

[creativeopinion]

@elbent You should use a Filter Query in the Get Items action to filter out items you want to run your subsequent actions on.

You might find this YT Tutorial Helpful: 3 Mistakes YOU 🫵 are Making with the Apply to Each Action in your Microsoft Power Automate Flow

In this video tutorial I’ll go over how to avoid these common mistakes when using the Apply to Each action in a Power Automate flow:

1️⃣ Looping through a Single Item

2️⃣ Creating Unnecessary Nested Loops

3️⃣ Looping through an Unfiltered Array

At the end of the video I share a few helpful insights when it comes to using the Apply to Each action in your flow.

I'll also cover:

✅ How to avoid the Apply to Each action with a single item array

✅ How to use the item() function to access dynamic content in an array

✅ How to prevent unnecessary nested Apply to Each action loops

✅ How to use the Select action

✅ How to convert an array to a string with the Select action

✅How to use the Filter Query field

✅ How to count the number of items in an array

✅ How to use a condition control

✅ How to use the concurrency control

✅ How to set a top count

✅ How to use Compose actions for troubleshooting

Hope this helps!

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[elbent]

I am not using Get Items, I am using the ID from the Create Item action. I also tried with Get Item (not Items) and had the same issue.