I would create a new worksheet with just the key values in column A. (Those
membership numbers are unique, right?)

You can just copy|paste creating a giant list with duplicates in this column A.

Then use Data|Advanced filter to get rid of the duplicates.
Debra Dalgleish describes it he
http://contextures.com/xladvfilter01.html#FilterUR

Then you could use the next 10 columns (B, C, ...) to use =vlookup()'s to
retrieve the data from each of the other 10 worksheets.

Depending on the version of excel, you can use =iferror() or
=if(iserror(vlookup()),"",vlookup())

Since you have lots of data, I think I'd do a single column at a time and verify
that the results are correct.

Then I'd convert that column to values and start on the next.

(If you don't convert to values, then you could have about 4000 * 10 * 2
vlookup() functions (depending on your version of excel) and that could slow
excel to a crawl.)




On 10/04/2011 10:24, Bob wrote:
OK, here's the situation...

I've got a membership database which has been exported from an Access Database
into a number of different Excel spreadsheets. And of course I don't have the
original! It's split into about 10 spreadsheets and I need to create a single
one by merging the data from the various sources.

All the spreadsheets start with "Membership number" in column 1, then different
data. The spreadsheets don't necessarily contain data for every membership
number, and in some cases there are multiple entries for the same membership
number. There are about 4000+ membership accounts, otherwise I'd just spend a
while on the copy/paste buttons.

Is there a way I can set up some sort of merge which will carry the various
elements of data into the primary spreadsheet with all the data for each
membership number spread across the cells on a single line?

Thanks in advance.

--
Dave Peterson