How to fix the “You don’t have permissions” error in Google Sheets IMPORTRANGE

If doing an IMPORTRANGE function in Google Sheets and you get the “You don’t have permissions to access that sheet.” error follow these steps:

1. First make sure the sheet you are importing is NOT the XLSX version for Office Compatibility.
   1. You can only run the IMPORTRANGE on Google Sheet formats and non-XLSX formats.
   2. To solve this, in your XLSX version select File -> Save as Google Sheet
   3. Update the IMPORTRANGE sheet URL to the new URL of the Google Sheet version.
2. Did you grant access to the other sheet?
   1. Sometimes you may not see the error or the problem with granting access. What I like to do is import a single cell somewhere is a open area to make sure.
   2. Example: =IMPORTRANGE(“your sheet’s full URL”,”SheetName!A1″) to import only cell A1
   3. It should either return the value of A1 or will prompt you to grant access.
3. Make sure the owner didn’t remove access. 😀