Modify my SQL Server query -- returns too many rows sometimes - sql

Question

I need to update the following query so that it only returns one child record (remittance) per parent (claim).
Table Remit_To_Activate contains exactly one date/timestamp per claim, which is what I wanted.
But when I join the full Remittance table to it, since some claims have multiple remittances with the same date/timestamps, the outermost query returns more than 1 row per claim for those claim IDs.
SELECT * FROM REMITTANCE
WHERE BILLED_AMOUNT>0 AND ACTIVE=0
AND REMITTANCE_UUID IN (
SELECT REMITTANCE_UUID FROM Claims_Group2 G2
INNER JOIN Remit_To_Activate t ON (
(t.ClaimID = G2.CLAIM_ID) AND
(t.DATE_OF_LATEST_REGULAR_REMIT = G2.CREATE_DATETIME)
)
where ACTIVE=0 and BILLED_AMOUNT>0
)
I believe the problem would be resolved if I included REMITTANCE_UUID as a column in Remit_To_Activate. That's the REAL issue. This is how I created the Remit_To_Activate table (trying to get the most recent remittance for a claim):
SELECT MAX(create_datetime) as DATE_OF_LATEST_REMIT,
MAX(claim_id) AS ClaimID,
INTO Latest_Remit_To_Activate
FROM Claims_Group2
WHERE BILLED_AMOUNT>0
GROUP BY Claim_ID
ORDER BY Claim_ID
Claims_Group2 contains these fields:
REMITTANCE_UUID,
CLAIM_ID,
BILLED_AMOUNT,
CREATE_DATETIME
Here are the 2 rows that are currently giving me the problem--they're both remitts for the SAME CLAIM, with the SAME TIMESTAMP. I only want one of them in the Remits_To_Activate table, so only ONE remittance will be "activated" per Claim:
enter image description here

Answer 1

You can change your query like this:
SELECT
p.*, latest_remit.DATE_OF_LATEST_REMIT
FROM
Remittance AS p inner join
(SELECT MAX(create_datetime) as DATE_OF_LATEST_REMIT,
claim_id,
FROM Claims_Group2
WHERE BILLED_AMOUNT>0
GROUP BY Claim_ID
ORDER BY Claim_ID) as latest_remit
on latest_remit.claim_id = p.claim_id;
This will give you only one row. Untested (so please run and make changes).

Answer 2

Without having more information on the structure of your database -- especially the structure of Claims_Group2 and REMITTANCE, and the relationship between them, it's not really possible to advise you on how to introduce a remittance UUID into DATE_OF_LATEST_REMIT.
Since you are using SQL Server, however, it is possible to use a window function to introduce a synthetic means to choose among remittances having the same timestamp. For example, it looks like you could approach the problem something like this:
select *
from (
select
r.*,
row_number() over (partition by cg2.claim_id order by cg2.create_datetime desc) as rn
from
remittance r
join claims_group2 cg2
on r.remittance_uuid = cg2.remittance_uuid
where
r.active = 0
and r.billed_amount > 0
and cg2.active = 0
and cg2.billed_amount > 0
) t
where t.rn = 1
Note that that that does not depend on your DATE_OF_LATEST_REMIT table at all, it having been subsumed into the inline view. Note also that this will introduce one extra column into your results, though you could avoid that by enumerating the columns of table remittance in the outer select clause.
It also seems odd to be filtering on two sets of active and billed_amount columns, but that appears to follow from what you were doing in your original queries. In that vein, I urge you to check the results carefully, as lifting the filter conditions on cg2 columns up to the level of the join to remittance yields a result that may return rows that the original query did not (but never more than one per claim_id).

Answer 3

A co-worker offered me this elegant demonstration of a solution. I'd never used "over" or "partition" before. Works great! Thank you John and Gaurasvsa for your input.
if OBJECT_ID('tempdb..#t') is not null
drop table #t
select *, ROW_NUMBER() over (partition by CLAIM_ID order by CLAIM_ID) as ROW_NUM
into #t
from
(
select '2018-08-15 13:07:50.933' as CREATE_DATE, 1 as CLAIM_ID, NEWID() as
REMIT_UUID
union select '2018-08-15 13:07:50.933', 1, NEWID()
union select '2017-12-31 10:00:00.000', 2, NEWID()
) x
select *
from #t
order by CLAIM_ID, ROW_NUM
select CREATE_DATE, MAX(CLAIM_ID), MAX(REMIT_UUID)
from #t
where ROW_NUM = 1
group by CREATE_DATE