When you’ve collected info via a Word form, you don’t have to manually enter it into Access. Mary Ann Richardson steps through an example that demonstrates the wizard way to knock out the task more efficiently and accurately.

A Word form makes it easy to gather information from users or clients so that you can analyze it later. But getting the information into an Access table can be time-consuming, not to say error-prone. To avoid having to print out and reenter data into a table, you can use the Access Import Text Wizard to bring in the form data for you.

Before you can use the wizard, you must save the form’s data to a text file. In this example, we have asked employees to complete the form shown in Figure A.

Figure A

Follow these steps to save the data in each completed form to a text file that will be imported into Access:

You can now import the data in the text files into an Access table by following these steps:

1. Create a blank database.
2. Click File | Get External Data | Import. (In Access 2007, click the External Data tab and then click the Text File button in the Import Group.)
3. Click in the File Name box and enter the full path name of the text file your want to import (Figure B).

Figure B

1. Click Import and then click Next.
2. Click the Delimited Button (Figure C) and then click Next.

Figure C

1. In the following window (Figure D), click Next again.

Figure D

1. Click the Field One Column and enter Project ID in the Field Name box.
2. Click the Field Two Column and enter Project Name in the Field Name box.
3. Click the Field Three Column and enter Project Start Date in the Field Name box.
4. Click the Field Four column enter Project End Date in the Field Name Box (Figure E).

Figure E

1. Click Next.
2. Click Choose My Own Primary Key.
3. Select Project ID from the drop-down list and click Next.
4. Enter Training Projects in the Name box.
5. Click Finish and then Close.

To add the next form, close the Training Projects table and follow these steps:

1. Start the Import Wizard in Access.
2. Enter the full path name of the next text file.
3. Click the Append button and select Training Projects from the drop-down list.
4. Click Next twice and then click Finish (Figure F).

Figure F



Important Note: If you need to enter more than a handful of forms a day, you should consider using  ADO (ActiveX Data Object) to create a code connection to the table that will automate the data transfer process.