Create Table - A table can't overlap another table.

[Anonymous]

Hi All, can you please help me to identify which the problem is here?

I'm trying to create a table with power automate, this is my flow

1. Run Desktop Flow: in the desktop flow I get an excel from sharepoint shared folder (from locally) I delete the worksheet with a table inside it, I create another worksheet putting inside it the data unformatted, save the excel

2. Add a delay, to let the file modification be available on sharepoint online

3. Create a table from the unformatted data of point (1)

The first time it works, but from the second one it give me the "A table can't overlap another table. " error.

Any suggestion?

Thanks

[CFernandes]

Hello @Anonymous 

The error "A table can't overlap another table. " error is because you already have a table in place in the excel file.

If you delete the old table manually, save the Excel file I am sure the Power Automate will not error out. Note: There is no action to delete the table

Before you create your table make sure you do a Get Tables and see what ranges other tables are using.  Then make sure your new table is outside of those ranges.

If this reply has answered your question or solved your issue, please mark this question as answered. Answered questions helps users in the future who may have the same issue or question quickly find a resolution via search. If you liked my response, please consider giving it a thumbs up. THANKS!

[Anonymous]

Hi @CFernandes, 

many thanks, but in the power automate desktop flow, I completely delete the worksheet and create a new one with new data, then in the service I create the table... so the table does not exist in excel once I try to create another table...

so --> delete worksheet and table inside it --> create new worksheet --> paste unformatted data --> try to create a new table on that data --> Error 

Thanks

[CFernandes]

Hello @Anonymous,

Ohh OK. I do not have Power Automate Desktop installed right now on my box so cannot test.

I would also request you to move/create a new question on https://powerusers.microsoft.com/t5/Power-Automate-Desktop/bd-p/MPADesktop as this is related to Power Automate Desktop.

If this reply has answered your question or solved your issue, please mark this question as answered. Answered questions helps users in the future who may have the same issue or question quickly find a resolution via search. If you liked my response, please consider giving it a thumbs up. THANKS!

[Anonymous]

Hi @CFernandes, it is not matter of power automate desktop but of power automate cloud since I create the table on the service after the running of power automated desktop flow that save the excel file on the sharepoint online directory.

Thanks,

[CFernandes]

@Anonymous Are you using the same Table ranges? If you try different Tables Ranges do you get the same error?

If this reply has answered your question or solved your issue, please mark this question as answered. Answered questions helps users in the future who may have the same issue or question quickly find a resolution via search. If you liked my response, please consider giving it a thumbs up. THANKS!

[Anonymous]

Hi @CFernandes, the table range is dynamic on rows number but by repeating the test several times, it is the same. But the thing I cannot understand is that there is no table on the online excel, but power automate get this error like it exists ... it seems like matter of cache ... I don't know....

[CFernandes]

Hey @Anonymous 

You are right, it happened to me on a live demo - See 21:08 in the video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Xzobptejp4

I had to create new excel file to get around that problem. I am out of idea's right now.

[Anonymous]

@CFernandes, thanks for checking. We wait then for a technical solution

[Anonymous]

I guess a solution never arrived from microsoft... 

[ElBaz]

I'm kind of having the same issue except the flow seems to work, even though it says it failed. I receive an excel file via email and it gets transferred to a folder on SharePoint via a flow. It then it's supposed to get converted to a table via a flow. The flow runs says it failed, but when I open the file, it has been converted to a table.  

[ElBaz]

I think I figured it out. After the file is created the flow runs, but then it wants to run again because the file was also modified. 

[PumpkinPie]

I've got the same issue. my excel sheet is alway clean with no table created, but it always showing this error. Occasionally, when it got through, but there is other error showing the source is not existed. In summary, steps with "create table" is not stable in real practice. 

[LuciusNoir]

Sooo, my flow is updating the .xlsx that already has a table in range A:O with just plain data, ultimately deleting that table. Then the Create Table node creates a new table in range A:O. 

I've encountered the error in question several times already, and a simple .xlsx template replacement was fixing the issue (just like @CFernandes's video example). Well, not anymore...

I've been running above flow for months now. Doesn't work anymore, all of a sudden. 

[dhock]

I'm having this issue as well. My flow takes a spreadsheet that is created automatically (report from a database) and does not have a table already in it. Most of the time it works fine, but sometimes, it seems that the default table (Table1) is already there when the Create Table action runs. I'm suspecting it actually gets created by the flow when the Create Table action doesn't work the first time. The Create Table action itself has a totally different table name specified ("Timesheets"). When it retries, it gets the error about a table not being able to overlap another.

[Anonymous]

I think @ElBaz is onto something. I was running into this same issue. A cloud flow of new file added running an office script that created a new table - same error despite the original file not having a table.  Based on the comment from ElBaz I switched my flow from a Created or Modified to a Created (which will work fine, if not better tbh, for my purposes) and that seemed to resolve the problem. I did have to change from directly selecting the file to using the property returned by the trigger for the file in the script ran on.

Not sure if it is helpful to others, but it solved it for me. Thanks @ElBaz! 

[CodeAvenue]

Just like @ElBaz and @Anonymous hinted, here's what is happening. It is likely you created a separate flow that grabs the file from an email and drops it the SharePoint folder. And if that already existed in the SharePoint folder, it gets overwritten with the new file. 
So, this process is a file creation process whether it was the first time the flow put the file in the SharePoint folder or overwrites an existing file. 
This table overlap error therefore occurs if your next flow that picks the file and creates the excel table is a "when a file is created or modified" SharePoint trigger. Why, it will see both the file creation and table creation (modify action) as two separate actions. And hence the flow running twice. 
Instead use the "when a file is created (properties only) SharePoint trigger and problem solved.