Can't Query Picklist Value not Defined in MetaData

Question

I've got a picklist Activity1__c with 2 values that don't actually exist in the metadata: "Reverse Reference - Completed" and "Reverse Reference - Incomplete". In other words those picklist values aren't defined.

However, they exist as someone has effectively set those values when writing to that field.

When I try to query this though like below, nothing is being fetched through.

List<Activity_Log__c> reverseReferencesList = new List<Activity_Log__c>();

for (Activity_Log__c a : [SELECT Id, Candidate__c, Person__c, Activity1__c FROM Activity_Log__c WHERE OwnerId = :user AND Activity1__c LIKE '%Reverse Reference%' AND CreatedDate >= :startDate AND CreatedDate < :endDate]) {
  if (String.valueOf(a.Activity1__c) == 'Reverse Reference - Completed') {
    reverseReferencesList.add(a);
  }
}

If I remove the if statement and just add those records to reverseReferencesList, records will appear in the Visualforce page. However if I try to specifically find "Reverse Reference - Completed", it returns nothing.

I've tried:

• Specifically querying for "Reverse Reference - Completed"
• Getting the String.valueOf() and filtering (as in the example), still returns nothing
• Adding the values to the PickList's metadata, but that has no effect

Is there any way around this for finding records by PickList value that aren't defined in the PickList metadata itself, but are written to the record?

Answer 1

Seems like Salesforce doesn't like dashes.

I firstly queried the following:

[SELECT Id, Candidate__c, Person__c, Activity1__c 
 FROM Activity_Log__c 
 WHERE OwnerId = :user 
       AND Activity1__c LIKE '%Completed%' 
       AND CreatedDate >= :startDate 
       AND CreatedDate < :endDate]

This bought up a correct list with "Completed" in, but with other unwanted records in. So then I added AND Activity1__c LIKE %Reverse Reference% to the query like below:

[SELECT Id, Candidate__c, Person__c, Activity1__c 
 FROM Activity_Log__c 
 WHERE OwnerId = :user 
       AND Activity1__c LIKE '%Completed%' 
       and Activity1__c LIKE '%Reverse Reference%' 
       AND CreatedDate >= :startDate 
       AND CreatedDate < :endDate]

Which then filtered everything properly. Adding the - in seemed to be causing complications. No idea why, but if someone has an explanation for this I'd appreciate it. Otherwise I'd say this is pretty much answered.