When opening the exported data in comma-separated value (CSV) file format in Microsoft Excel, the data is formatted incorrectly. Dates are in multiple formats and/or incorrect, leading zeroes get removed, all data is in a single column etc.

The CSV files don't contain any information about how values in them are formatted so when opening one Microsoft Excel uses the settings from the computer locale.
Dates in CSV files from Ariba are exported in the English-US format MM/DD/YYYY - 11th July 2019 will be exported as 07/11/2019 (you can verify that by opening an exported CSV file in Notepad or similar text editor). If you try to open this file in Microsoft Excel and your computer is set to use the date format DD/MM/YYYY, this date will be imported as 7th November 2019. These default import settings can affect other fields as well, e.g. converting IDs from text to numbers, using incorrect thousands and decimal separators, not splitting CSV into columns properly etc.

To import CSV files into Microsoft Excel properly, you need to use its data import function. It's exact position and functionality will differ based on the exact version of Microsoft Excel you are using. In the current version, Microsoft Excel 365, Follow these steps:

1. Open a blank Excel workbook
2. On the "Data" tab click From Text/CSV
3. Select the exported CSV file and click Open

Optionally - if you are experiencing issues with special characters in reports, in the File Origin select "65001: Unicode (UTF-8)"

1. Click Transform Data
2. Right-click on the date column you wish to change and select Change Type - Using Locale
3. In the Change Type with Locale window select Data Type Date and Locale English - United States and click OK
4. Click Close & Load

This will load the CSV data into Microsoft Excel properly.

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