ISBLANK is a handy function to use with your IF statements. Here is a simple, practical example.
The exercise and the result are in the Isblank file.
Suppose we are a local supplier and sell to both for profit and non profit groups. We need to figure out the sales tax.
By using ISBLANK, we can quickly put in the tax rate for each customer. One beauty of this is that every cell then has a formula, rather than manually erasing formulas where a value is not needed.
We used ISBLANK in two different calculations:
Tax Rate- =IF(ISBLANK(E2),0.06,"")
Sales Tax- =IF(ISBLANK(E2),ROUND(B2*C2,2),"")
The syntax is ISBLANK and then in the parenthesis, the range being referred to.
ISBLANK is a true/false function, which makes it ideal for using in the test within IF statements, like we did above. In the Tax Rate calculation, we test to see if there is any entry in the Type column. If there is not, the customer is not exempt, so the formula adds the tax rate.
You could go into the Type column and change the setting for any customer and see the rate and sales tax automatically change. This is why it is better to use ISBLANK and have a formula for every cell, rather than not having a formula for any exempt customer.
ISBLANK is a good formula to have handy when you will have blanks in fields that you are working with. We use it with calculations, whether on small calculations or building fields in larger lists.