Countifs not referencing same cells and getting 0

[WesGrin]

I am trying to use CountIfs and every thread I come across all reference when someone is trying to reference the same cells for different criteria, which I understand why that does not work.
What I am trying to do is reference three columns all for different data, but I am getting zeros.

=COUNTIFS(REPORT!$P:$P,"GEORGE",REPORT!$Q:$Q,"APPROVE",REPORT!$R:$R,"JULY")

It's noteworthy to mention that this formula worked before I added the 3rd criteria for July. I wanted to count number of applications by George that were approved in the month of July.
I need to be able to separate applications by underwriter that were approved and in certain months.

 

[DanteAmor]

Hi @WesGrin, welcome to the forum!

In column R, do you have dates or the text "July"?

 

[WesGrin]

I just realized the raw data has the dates with time with seconds, even AM or PM. Even when I format the column to show only "July", the formula is still wanting " 7/16/2019 2:45:28 PM" to work properly.
The issue is now, can I do anything to adjust tens of thousands of rows where the date has all this extra noise?

 

[DanteAmor]

You can create an auxiliary column to get the month

=TEXTO(R2,"mmmm")

Or you can use this formula

=SUMPRODUCT((P2:P10="GEORGE")*(Q2:Q10="APPROVE")*(TEXTO(R2:R10,"mmm")="jul"))

Try to use a range of P:P100 cells (or a reasonable number of rows)
Do not use the entire P:P column because it slows down the sheet