Why is there a difference in the treatment of the Amount and OrderQty columns?

Question

In this unit (Unit 3 of the module Design a semantic model in Power BI), a new measure (Total Sales) has been used to sum up the values in the Amount column of the Sales table while creating a new table of sales records for each year and month. However, the OrderQty column is directly pulled from the Sales table without any such measure being used for summing up the total order quantity for that year and month.

Why is it so? Are there any differences between the OrderQty and the Amount columns in the Sales table that makes this necessary or is this just an alternative?

This question is related to the following Learning Module

Answer 1

Hi Prajwal K,

Thank you for reaching out to us on the Microsoft Q&A forum.

The Amount column represents revenue, which requires a measure (e.g., SUM(Sales[Amount])) to aggregate it by time periods like year or month. On the other hand, the OrderQty column represents the number of items ordered per transaction. Since it’s a count, Power BI can automatically sum it when grouped by time periods without needing a separate measure.

In summary, Amount needs a measure for aggregation, while OrderQty can be summed directly.

If you are still facing any issue, please let us know in the comments and where you are encountering this error along with the screenshot for reference. We are glad to help you.

Please don’t forget to Accept Answer and Yes for "was this answer helpful" wherever the information provided helps you, this can be beneficial to other community members.

Thank you.