PL-300 Model the data Practice Question
You have a data model with a Sales table and a Date table. You create a measure: Total Sales = SUM(Sales[Amount]). When you add a slicer for Date[Year], the measure does not filter correctly. What is the most likely cause?
⚠ Common exam trap
Test-takers frequently assume a slicer will automatically filter any measure referencing a related table, but they overlook that an inactive relationship requires explicit activation in the measure for filtering to work.
Answer choices
Why each option matters
Answer the question above first, then reveal the full breakdown to understand why each option is right or wrong.
Correct answer & explanation
✓
The relationship is inactive
The most likely cause is that the relationship between the Sales table and the Date table is inactive. In Power BI, only one active relationship can exist between two tables; any additional relationships must be inactive. A slicer on Date[Year] will only filter through the active relationship. If the active relationship is not the one intended for the measure, the slicer will not affect the measure's result. Using USERELATIONSHIP in the measure or setting the correct relationship as active would resolve this.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✓
The relationship is inactive
Why this is correct
A relationship marked as inactive does not automatically propagate filters during evaluation. Even though a physical relationship exists between Sales and Date, it is bypassed unless the measure explicitly invokes USERELATIONSHIP (e.g., CALCULATE(SUM(Sales[Amount]), USERELATIONSHIP(Sales[DateKey], Date[DateKey]))). Because that activation is missing, the slicer on Date does not filter the measure and every date shows the same grand-total value.
- ✗
The Date table is not marked as a date table
Why it's wrong here
Marking a date table as a date table only enables time-intelligence functions like TOTALYTD or DATEADD to behave correctly; it is not a prerequisite for ordinary filter propagation. A slicer that is bound to a date column will filter related tables through any active relationship regardless of the table's date-table property. Therefore, leaving the Date table unmarked would not cause a slicer to have zero effect on a simple aggregated measure.
- ✗
The Sales table has no relationship to the Date table
Why it's wrong here
If there were truly no relationship between Sales and Date, the slicer would indeed have no effect because no filter would be able to travel from one table to the other. However, the scenario indicates that a relationship is present—just inactive—so the problem is the absence of an active relationship, not absence of a relationship altogether. With no relationship at all, you would see no filtering for any measure, including row-level sums, whereas with an inactive relationship you can restore filtering via USERELATIONSHIP in the measure.
- ✗
The measure uses SUM instead of SUMX
Why it's wrong here
SUM(Tablename[Column]) returns the sum of all numeric values in that column, which is exactly what a standard measure requires for a basic fact table column. SUMX is intended for row-by-row evaluation where each row's expression must be computed before summation, such as multiplying two columns per row. Using SUM instead of SUMX would not prevent a slicer from filtering; it is a performance and correctness consideration only when the expression needs to be evaluated at row level.
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Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
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