

If you type the cell references manually (instead of pointing to them), Excel will not use the GETPIVOTDATA function. When we have used the pointing technique (selecting cells with the mouse when entering formula) to create a formula, Excel replaced those simple cell references with a much more complicated function GETPIVOTDATA.

Then we entered “=” sign, then selected cell J3, then entered “/” sign, and lastly selected cell I3. To enter the formula in cell M3, we have selected cell M3 at first. Formulas entered into cells M3, M4, M5, and M6 will calculate the expense-to-income ratio for each year and grand total. We entered a formula in column M, and this column is not part of our pivot table. We shall use this pivot table to explain cell references within this pivot table.
