An impossible case?

Question

Hello everybody,
As announced in my earlier question about calculating age in a spreadsheet (thanks again for solving that), I have yet another problem, which at this point I would call an impossible case. I am therefor hoping for the pro's on this forum, to help me once again on this mind dazzling puzzle (at least for me...
_The case:_
I am working on a sheet for sales representatives. Each sales rep has his own sheet and gets commission on sales every month. The height of the Sales Commission Percentage (SCP) depends on two things: age and/or "sales status" (Class 1, 2 and 3).
_What I would like:_
After manual input of only date of birth and "sales status", to have the SCP calculated automatically. Easy you say? Don't be fooled, there are quite a lot of possibilities:
_SCP calculation:_
If somebody's age is:
18 - 16,5%
19 - 14,5%
20 - 11%
21 and up - 10%
If somebody's sales status is:
Class 1: - 10%
Class 2 - 12,5%
Class 3 - 15%
The difficult part is:
When somebody is 18 and Class 2, or 19 and Class 3... My goal is to have the highest percentage of the 2 arguments as the final SCP.
_What did I come up with so far?_
The longest formula in the world, probably... But it is still not doing exacly what I want. I probably have no knowledge of a few arguments I might be able to use, but in my formula, the problem is that, if somebody is 18 and Class2, the percentages of the two arguments are added up.
_My formula_...(I have translated it in english):
=IF(OR(B2=21;B2=22;B2>=23;B5="class 1";B5="");10)+IF(OR(B5="class 2");12,5)+IF(OR(B5="class 3");15)IF(OR(B2=20);(11-10))+IF(OR(B2=19);(14,5-10))IF(OR(B2=18);(16,5-10))
_Important to know:_
B2 = age (manual input)
B5 = sales status (manual input)
I used the deductions in the last half of the formula, to get the right result.
I am very curious if this can be calculated in a spreadsheet or...that this is an impossible case...
Thanks in advance.
Maarten
Message was edited by: Maarmarg
Message was edited by: Maarmarg

Answer 1

Hi Maarten,
You wrote:
"SCP calculation:
If somebody's age is:
18 - 16,5%
19 - 14,5%
20 - 11%
21 and up - 10%
If somebody's sales status is:
Class 1: - 10%
Class 2 - 12,5%
Class 3 - 15%
The difficult part is:
When somebody is 18 and Class 2, or 19 and Class 3... My goal is to have the highest percentage of the 2 arguments as the final SCP."
As is often the case when considering fomulas, there's more than one way to skin a cat (gruesome English figure of speech).
I agree with Ric Donato; the simplest solution is likely one using a pair of lookup tables (and the MAX() function).
B2 = age (manual input)
B5 = sales status (manual input)
Age may be a manual input, or may be the result of a calculation. It must be a number (with no added text).
Sales status must also be a number (eg. 2, not Class 2).
The lookup tables may be placed in any otherwise unused part of the spreadsheet. For the example, I've placed them in columns J and K, starting at row 1.
Enter these values in the indicated cells.
J1: 0    K1: 0,165
J2: 18  K2: 0,165
J3: 19  K3: 0,145
J4: 20  K4: 0,11
J5: 21  K5: 0,10
J6: 99  K6: 0,10
J11: 0   K11: 01,0
J12: 1   K12: 0,10
J13: 2   K13: 0,125
J14: 3   K14: 0,15
J15: 99 K15: 0,15
Note that the percentages are entered as the equivalent decimal fraction and that there are two extra lines to allow for underflow (eg. a fifteen year old salesperson) and overflow (eg. a salesperson over 21 years old).
In the cell where you wish to display the commission rate, enter this formula:
=MAX(LOOKUP(B2,J1..J6,K1..K6),LOOKUP(B5,J11..J15,K11..K15))
Regards,
Barry