Tutorial Categories

Changing Reporting Values Best Practices

While we recommend that you ensure your reporting values are correct before you open the survey, you can change them in certain instances if you need to. Before you decide to change your reporting values however, please see read through this tutorial.

Don't know what a reporting value is? Visit our Reporting Values Tutorial to learn more!

Best Practices

ALWAYS export your data prior to changing your reporting values (just to make sure you have a back up)

Close your survey before changing your reporting values (this will prevent more respondents from being locked into the old values.)

Compatible Question Types

All Question Types except Table of Dropdown Menus and Custom Tables

What Doesn't Work

API - You cannot change your reporting values dynamically through the REST API

Add/Edit in Bulk - You cannot change your reporting values in bulk at this time

Items in your survey that will not be updated

When you change your reporting values, it will only change the values associated with the questions themselves (inside the question editor). Things you'll need to make sure you update manually are listed below:

Data that was generated by merge codes in responses received prior to the change

Example: If you have a Review Response action in an individual response, it will display the old reporting values, not the new ones. If you want to update this, you'll have to go through the edit link process listed above.

Custom Scripting/JavaScript

Example: If your custom scripting action/JavaScript code is using Reporting Values to trigger something, you will need to go in and change those manually.

What if I have multiple reporting values that are the same, will the system know which one to change?

Yes! The reporting values will change based on the answer option sku.
So for example, if you have the following question (reporting values are in parentheses):

What is your favorite color?

Red (1)

Orange (2)

Yellow (3)

Green (4)

Blue (5)

Purple (5)

All you would need to do is change the reporting value for blue or purple to something else (in this instance I'll change purple to 6).

What is your favorite color?

Red (1)

Orange (2)

Yellow (3)

Green (4)

Blue (5)

Purple (6)

Now, when you run your data, the database will be able to tell the difference, and retroactively update any answers that were previously (5) for purple to 6!

How do I change my Reporting Value?

Edit the question where you'd like to change the reporting values. Enter the new reporting value In the Reporting Values column of the answer option and click Save Question.

Have questions? Want to comment on this? Join the discussion on our SurveyGizmo Support site.