Indirect index and match problem formula in different named tables - excel

Question

I have a cell where I want to get the tax% based on a criteria
Coming from "Taxes", depends on manufacturer country, year of release and car type
I've tried to use search and index and its not working at all, I need the cell to check values in the manufacturer country, year of release and car type use these inputs go to the Taxes sheet and get the value

Answer 1

Before I start, I should come clean and say I am an evangelist for the OFFSET() function, and a mortal foe of INDIRECT().
Let's assume that the number of vehicle types (TRUCKS, SEDANS, ....) is the same for each country, ie 8. (If its not then that can be worked around with a bit more effort). You could put this number in a cell somewhere and use it when you need the number of types.
Also, let's say the first column in your screenshot is column A. And that the cell A1 contains "China".
Let's say we are looking for the tax rate in 2009, for SEDANS in France.
Function 1:
=MATCH("France",$A:$A,0) will return 14 (if I have counted correctly)
... ie cell A14 contains the word "France".
On the assumption that the years are the same for all countries we can use any of the header rows to find the right column.
Function 2:
=MATCH(2009,$3:$3,0)-1 will return 8 I think.
If your years are just strings of text, then replace 2009 with "2009".
Because your Types are not in the same order in each table (why?) we need an extra step.
Function 3:
=MATCH("SEDANS",OFFSET($A$1,(Result of f1) -1 + 3,0,8,1),0) should return 3.
What is the maths in the OFFSET function? I need to go down (14-1) rows from cell A1 to get to "France". From there I need to go down another 3 rows to get to the first of the list of Types, and there are 8 types to search in. I'm then looking at a range of cells which is 8 rows x 1 column.
Now you can extract your tax rate, using
Function 4:
=INDEX(OFFSET($A$1,(Result of f1) -1+3,1,8,100),(Result of f3),(Result of f2))
(I've put 100 as I don't know how many columns of years you have. You could use something like =COUNTA($3:$3)-1 if there was nothing else in the 3rd row after the last date).
I would put the results of each function in a cell while you test this. Once you are happy that each step is working correctly you can nest all the various functions together, or alternatively just put some extra columns on the right hand side of your results table, which you can Hide if you want to.
EDITED: To add some $ on cell references to lock the "origin" of the data.

Answer 2

If your tax tables are real Tables, each NAME'd with the name of the respective country, you can use something like:
=VLOOKUP(H13,INDIRECT(H12),MATCH(TEXT(H14,"0"),INDIRECT(H12 & "[#Headers]"),0))
where
H12 contains the name of the country
H13 contains the Type of vehicle
H14 contains the Year
eg:
You'll need to adapt this to your real ranges, but this provides an approach.
I'd suggest using dropdown lists (from Data Validation) in H13:H14 in order to avoid typos.
If you want to avoid using Tables and also the volatile functions OFFSET and INDIRECT (because if you have a lot of volatile functions they can impair performance of your worksheet) you can try the non-volatile, but longer and more obscure:
=VLOOKUP($H$13,INDEX($A:$A,MATCH($H$12,$A:$A,0)):INDEX($D:$D,LOOKUP(2,1/($A:$A<>""),ROW($A:$A))),$H$14-2000,FALSE)
In the above, you'll have to make adjustments
Assumptions are:
The country name is above the relevant tax table
Tax table starts in Column A
Change references to Column A if it does not start there.
Change the reference to Column D to the last column of your tax table (or even further if you will be expanding it).
The Year columns are labelled the same for all countries (eg: consecutive years starting at 2002)
$H$14-2000 calculates the column argument for the VLOOKUP function.