Join 3 fact table together with one-to-many relationship

Hi Anushree2929 

Your instinct is right, don't connect fact tables directly in Power BI. Use a star schema instead.

Why fact-to-fact is not recomended on your approach: 

• Wrong totals – different grains cause row duplication and inflated sums.
• Confusing filters – filter direction gets unpredictable.
• Slower – Power BI's engine is built for star schemas.
• Hard to maintain – nobody trusts the numbers as the model grows.

The recomended workaround: Star Schema: 

• Facts connect only to dimensions (Date, Product, Customer…).
• Facts never connect to facts.
• Relationships: one-to-many, single direction, Dim → Fact.
• Compare facts (Sales vs. Budget) through shared dimensions.

Dim_Date ─┬─► Fact_Sales
                   ├─► Fact_Budget
                   └─► Fact_Inventory
Dim_Product ┘ (shared across all)

What to discuss with your data engineer: 

1. Build shared dimensions (Date, Product, Customer).
2. Remove fact-to-fact relationships.
3. Connect each fact to the shared dimensions.
4. Keep relationships single-direction.
5. Compare a cross-fact measure before/after old totals were likely inflated.

Exception: header/detail like Sales_Header → Sales_Lines is okay.

Reference links: Start Schema Guidance

Thanks,
Srikanth Cheri.