The sum of cells should be presented in brackets. Sum of 1, 2 and 8 equals to (11).

I have found two ways to tackle this issue.

First one is simply to treat the sum as a key string. The first digit is the first bracket, then the SUM function and finally the second bracket.

The formula in C3 is also here for copy pasting.

=”(” & (SUM(B4:B6)) & “)”

Another option is to change the cell format. Write the normal SUM function to C4 saying = SUM(B4:B6) as usually. Then select home – number of activate cell C3 and press control+1.

Select Custom in write (0) in Type: field.

For further calculations with sums in brackets:

The key string with brackets is considered to be negative.

In the second option, with format cells, Excel understands the C3 as a positive value.