Your Microsoft Technology Development and Consulting Experts - Operating since 2000
Every desktop Microsoft Office application comes with a powerful built-in programming language called Visual Basic for Applications, or VBA. Whichever Office product your team works in, our highly experienced VBA programmers are ready to build the solution that takes your business to the next level.
Macros let us automate repetitive work, validate what your staff enter, and link your Office files to databases, websites and third-party products. VBA runs on the Office you already have, with no extra licence, hosting or software to buy.
From a simple recorded macro to a system that ties Excel, Word, Access and Outlook to your databases and APIs, we cover the full range. This page is your starting point for all of it.
Pick the application your team lives in. The same VBA skills apply across all of them, which is why one project can start in Excel, build a document in Word and finish with an email in Outlook.
Excel is where most VBA starts and where it does the most work. We turn fragile, formula-heavy workbooks into tools your whole team can trust, with forms for data entry, one-click reporting and live connections to the systems your data comes from.
Word macros keep documents complete and on brand, whoever is typing. We build popup forms that fill a template for your staff, custom ribbon tabs that lock formatting down, and builders that assemble long reports from a library of approved content.
In Access, VBA is what turns tables into a finished application: forms, navigation, validation, document generation and exports. We build and repair that code, and when the data outgrows Access we move it to SQL Server while keeping the front end your staff already know.
If the same presentation is rebuilt every month or quarter, a macro should be doing it. We generate slides from Excel or database data, apply your template and branding consistently, and handle the bulk edits nobody wants to do by hand.
Outlook macros can sort, file, reply to and report on email, or send personalised messages from data held in Excel or Access. One thing to plan for: VBA runs in classic Outlook and not in the new Outlook for Windows, so we design around that from the start.
All Office products come with a macro recorder that captures a series of steps so you can repeat them. The recorder writes the VBA for you, but it is only the tip of the iceberg. These are the things we build once the recorder runs out of road.
Data-entry forms that check answers as people type, offer drop-downs and conditional fields, and write straight into your workbook, document or database.
See popup forms for WordPut your most-used functions one click away on a tab of your own. Fewer errors, less training and more consistent results across the team.
Custom toolbars and ribbonsLive links from your workbooks to SQL databases, Access, SharePoint, Dataverse, text files and third-party applications, so the numbers are always current.
SQL Server and Access integrationHours of data entry, formatting and file handling become a one-click process. What used to take an afternoon takes seconds, and it is done the same way every time.
Business process automationPull data from websites, REST APIs and online services straight into Office, so critical information arrives in your spreadsheet without anyone copying and pasting.
3rd party app integrationMulti-level checks that stop mistakes at the point of entry and keep data consistent across workbooks, documents and databases.
Charts, pivot tables and formatted reports generated on demand or on a schedule, ready to present or send.
Dashboards and reportingClean, sort, filter, merge and transform large datasets to your rules, including custom algorithms for the awkward jobs.
Data manipulation servicesVBA can drive one Office application from inside another. That is how a database record becomes a finished Word proposal, a spreadsheet becomes a branded presentation, or a form becomes an email with the right attachment.
A form in Excel or Access collects the details and checks them before anything is created.
VBA opens your Word template or PowerPoint deck and fills it from the data, using your approved styles.
The finished file is saved as a PDF and filed in the right folder with the right name.
Outlook creates the email, attaches the file and sends it, or leaves it open for a final check.
Microsoft now offers several ways to automate Office, and VBA is still the right answer for a lot of jobs. It isn't the right answer for all of them. As part of our business analysis, we tell you which one fits, even when it isn't VBA.
Desktop Office on your computer. It does not run in Excel for the web or the new Outlook.
Work that crosses applications, custom forms and ribbons, event-driven automation, and anything that has to run offline or touch files on the machine. No extra licence.
Macros must be enabled and trusted, and some security policies restrict them.
Excel on the web, Windows and Mac, with an enterprise or education licence.
Cloud automation of Excel files in SharePoint or OneDrive, especially when Power Automate triggers it.
Excel only. There are no Excel events, so scripts run only when a person or a flow starts them, and they cannot reach the machine.
Inside worksheet cells, with the calculations run in the Microsoft cloud.
Statistics, data analysis and charting with Python libraries, using data already in the workbook.
It analyses data in cells. It does not drive the Office interface or other applications.
Unattended in the cloud, across Microsoft 365 and many other services.
Scheduled and event-driven processes where nobody is at the keyboard, including running Office Scripts.
There is no VBA connector, so a desktop macro cannot be triggered from a flow.
Most real projects use more than one: a VBA form on the desktop, a Power Automate flow overnight, an Office Script in between.
We design the mix around how your team works, and you can read more about business process automation. Microsoft's features, names and licensing change often, so we check the current documentation before we recommend anything.
Copilot, ChatGPT and Claude can all write VBA, and our developers use them too. They are quick at first drafts. The trouble starts when code written in isolation is dropped into a workbook, template or database it knows nothing about.
A macro can look right and still overwrite the wrong range, point at a file path from someone else's computer, or fall over the first time a user does something unexpected. If you have macros that were built that way and have stopped working, we can review, repair and document them.
This is one of the calls we get most often. Macros that ran for years stop working after a move to 64-bit Office, Microsoft 365 or a new PC. The cause is nearly always one of a handful of known issues, and each one has a fix.
consult@officeexperts.com.au
1300 102 810' Before: fails on 64-bit OfficeDeclare Function GetActiveWindow Lib "user32" () As Long' After: runs on 32-bit and 64-bit OfficeDeclare PtrSafe Function GetActiveWindow Lib "user32" () As LongPtrPtrSafe and LongPtr to run on 64-bit Office, and each one has to be found and checked by hand.Code written for 32-bit Office calls Windows in ways 64-bit Office rejects. 64-bit has been the default install since Office 2019 and Microsoft 365, and legacy ActiveX controls are a common blocker too.
ActiveX and VBScript migrationMacros that run external .vbs files or use the VBScript RegExp library need attention. Microsoft 365 version 2508 added a built-in RegExp class so the library is no longer needed, but older builds need a different fix.
Since 2022, Office on Windows blocks macros in files that arrive from the internet or as email attachments, with no Enable button. The file has to be unblocked, kept in a Trusted Location, or signed by a trusted publisher.
VBA and COM add-ins aren't supported in the new Outlook for Windows. Classic Outlook keeps working, and we can move the logic to Power Automate, Microsoft Graph or a web add-in when you're ready.
Office 2016 and 2019 reached end of support on 14 October 2025, and Office 2021 followed on 13 October 2026. Office 2024 and LTSC 2024 are supported until October 2029. An upgrade is the right time to review your macros.
Upgrades and migrationSupport dates are from Microsoft's published lifecycle information. Check Microsoft's site for your exact edition.
We create add-ins with VBA that extend all of your Office products. In Excel, an add-in makes your macros available to every workbook the moment it opens, so nobody copies modules from file to file. In Word and PowerPoint, it keeps your branding and formatting tools one click away, and it is how we put an end to messy documents that break corporate branding.
There are several ways to build and deploy them, and the right choice depends on your environment and how your team shares files. We'll point your company in the right direction and look after the full build.
Need something heavier than VBA? See our .NET development and app and custom development services.
VBA projects go wrong when the requirements are misunderstood. That is why every project starts with business analysis: we invest the time up front to understand exactly what you need before we write a line of code.
Get started nowWe start by understanding your existing process: what works, what doesn't, and which manual steps you want gone. We agree the result you are after.
We map out the design: which Office applications are involved, what forms and screens people will use, and where the data lives. You review it, and we give you a detailed quote with no mid-project surprises.
We build inside an Office environment that matches yours and test against your real data, including edge cases, error conditions and multiple users where it matters.
You get documentation and a walkthrough for the people who will use it every day. We are here for changes, extensions and compatibility fixes as Office continues to change.
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Read all case studies
The client's staff created quoting reports in Word from existing templates, hunting through each document to find and complete a large number of fields, with no way to tell afterwards whether any had been missed. We built a pop-up form that gathers every field in one place, checks that mandatory fields are complete and populates the report automatically. The drop-down lists behind it sit in a single background document that the Administrator maintains and rolls out to every template.
See the pop-up form
A corporate group needed consistent, professional templates across four related entities. We built a custom Master Template for each entity from a single shared Global Common template, then added a custom Formatting tab with a copy/paste macro that strips foreign formatting out of pasted content and applies the approved styling automatically.
See the copy/paste macro
A food manufacturer built and costed every product in disconnected, in-house Excel workbooks. Data didn't flow between them and key costing components were missing. We rebuilt it as a single Excel Costing Workbook with a forms interface, automatic cost updates and a restricted Admin view of the core costing data.
See the Excel costing workbookCan't see your question here? Call us on 1300 102 810 or tell us about your project and we'll point you in the right direction.
VBA (Visual Basic for Applications) is the programming language built into desktop Microsoft Office. It is used to automate repetitive tasks, build custom forms, ribbons and functions, move data between Excel, Word, Access, PowerPoint and Outlook, and connect them to databases and other systems.
Yes. VBA is included in the desktop versions of Office and needs no extra licence. It does not run in Office on the web or in the new Outlook for Windows. Microsoft's newer automation tools are Office Scripts, Power Automate and Python in Excel, so we advise which one suits each job.
Compare the optionsThe usual causes are a move to 64-bit Office, macros blocked in files that came from the internet or email, code that relies on VBScript, a switch to the new Outlook, or an Office version that has gone out of support. We review the code, find the cause and fix it.
Upgrades and migrationYes. We regularly pick up macros that are undocumented, written by a former employee or generated by an AI tool. We review them, repair what is broken, add documentation and make them safe for your team to keep using.
Use VBA for desktop work, jobs that cross Excel, Word, Outlook and Access, and custom forms and ribbons. Office Scripts suit cloud-based Excel automation on SharePoint or OneDrive, especially when Power Automate triggers them. Many projects use both.
Properly built and deployed, yes. A macro has the same access to your computer as the application running it, which is why Office on Windows blocks macros in files from the internet by default. We sign add-ins, use Trusted Locations and keep each macro to the access it needs.
Every project is different, so we scope and quote after a short conversation about what you need, with no mid-project surprises. Contact us for a free consultation.
Request a quoteYes. We work remotely across Australia and New Zealand, with on-site support when needed, and our consultants are based in nearly every major Australian city.
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