Link to external file in LO Calc returns incorrect data

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Hello,

I've built a workbook to track membership data for a women's club. There is a workbook for each month the club meets. One section of the workbook takes the number of members at the end of the previous month, adds members who join in the current month, and subtracts members who've either resigned or died in the current month to obtain the number of members in the club at the end of the current month. For a given month, the number of members at the end of the previous month is obtained via a reference to the cell containing this data in the previous month's workbook.

The problem I'm having is that sometimes this external reference returns correct data, and sometimes it returns incorrect data, and I have no idea why. I've tried to be very careful to define the external references correctly, but perhaps I've made an error.

I've attached five small .ods files containing excerpts from workbooks for Sept, Oct, Nov, Dec, and Jan. These files are all saved in the same directory on my Windows 10 computer. I'm running LO 6.2.5.2. If I open the Oct workbook, it correctly links to the end of month data for Sept, and similarly for Nov and Dec. However, when I open the Jan workbook, the link returns 0 as the number of members at the end of December, which is incorrect. If I open the Dec workbook, save it, keep it open, then open the Jan workbook and "update" the link, I get correct data for Jan. Then if I save and close both workbooks and later come back and open Jan, the link returns 0 again, or sometimes it returns correct data.

Thanks for any help.

C:\fakepath\Sep 2019 Sign-In Sheet.ods C:\fakepath\Oct 2019 Sign-In Sheet.ods C:\fakepath\Nov 2019 Sign-In Sheet.ods C:\fakepath\Dec 2019 Sign-In Sheet.ods C:\fakepath\Jan 2020 Sign-In Sheet.ods