Question

Is it ok to use ‘NULL’ value in the deal.tariff_id to represent that it belong to any tariffs in the tariff_data table with affiliate_id=3?

For example:

mysql> select * from phone;
+----+------------------+
| id | name             |
+----+------------------+
|  4 | HTC Sensation XL |
| 26 | iPhone 4s        |
| 25 | iPhone 5         |
| 24 | Nokia C3-01      |
+----+------------------+

mysql> select * from tariff;
+----+-----------------+-----------------+--------------+-------------+
| id | name            | tariff_duration | monthly_cost | description |
+----+-----------------+-----------------+--------------+-------------+
|  1 | Business Plan 1 |              24 |         5.00 |             |
|  2 | Business Plan 2 |              24 |        10.00 |             |
|  4 | Business Plan 3 |              24 |        15.52 |             |
|  5 | Business Plan 4 |              24 |        18.52 |             |
|  8 | Super Plan      |              12 |        15.00 |             |
+----+-----------------+-----------------+--------------+-------------+

mysql> select * from tariff_data;
+----+-----------+--------------+-------+
| id | tariff_id | affiliate_id | bonus |
+----+-----------+--------------+-------+
|  1 |         1 |            3 | 34.00 |
|  2 |         2 |            3 | 44.00 |
|  5 |         3 |            3 | 10.00 |
|  6 |         4 |            3 | 10.00 |
|  7 |         5 |            3 | 10.00 |
+----+-----------+--------------+-------+

On a deal table, you can see affiliate_id=3 and tariff_id=NULL is belong to any tariff that are listed in tariff_data table. I did this to reduce amounts of rows in the deal. If I don’t include NULL that mean I have to include many tariff_id with same phone_id and vice versa.

mysql> select * from deal;
+----+----------+-----------+--------------+--------+
| id | phone_id | tariff_id | affiliate_id | active |
+----+----------+-----------+--------------+--------+
|  1 |        4 |      NULL |            3 |      1 |
|  3 |       24 |      NULL |            3 |      1 |
|  9 |       24 |         8 |            4 |      1 |
| 10 |       25 |         8 |            4 |      1 |
| 11 |       26 |         8 |            4 |      1 |
+----+----------+-----------+--------------+--------+

Update, example if I did not use NULL value:

mysql> select * from deal;
+----+----------+-----------+--------------+--------+
| id | phone_id | tariff_id | affiliate_id | active |
+----+----------+-----------+--------------+--------+
|  1 |        4 |         1 |            3 |      1 |
|  2 |        4 |         2 |            3 |      1 |
|  3 |       24 |         1 |            3 |      1 |
|  4 |       24 |         2 |            3 |      1 |
|  5 |       24 |         3 |            3 |      1 |
|  6 |       24 |         4 |            3 |      1 |
|  7 |       24 |         5 |            3 |      1 |
|  9 |       24 |         8 |            4 |      1 |
| 10 |       25 |         8 |            4 |      1 |
| 11 |       26 |         8 |            4 |      1 |
+----+----------+-----------+--------------+--------+

Answer 1

As the other two answers, this is not a good idea. Here’s a suggestion for normalization.

You want some of the deals to represent a “general” deal, irregardless of tariff. You can split the deail table into two, one for simple deals and one for the general ones:

mysql> select * from deal_simple;
+----+----------+-----------+--------------+--------+
| id | phone_id | tariff_id | affiliate_id | active |
+----+----------+-----------+--------------+--------+
|    |       24 |         8 |            4 |      1 |
|    |       25 |         8 |            4 |      1 |
|    |       26 |         8 |            4 |      1 |
+----+----------+-----------+--------------+--------+

mysql> select * from deal_general_tariff;
+----+----------+--------------+--------+
| id | phone_id | affiliate_id | active |
+----+----------+--------------+--------+
|    |        4 |            3 |      1 |
|    |       24 |            3 |      1 |
+----+----------+--------------+--------+

You could then have the expanded results with the simple query (I assume you did not include by mistake 3 more rows that relate phone_id 4 with tariff_id 3, 4, 5):

SELECT phone_id, tariff_id, affiliate_id, active
FROM deal_simple

UNION

SELECT dgt.phone_id, td.tariff_id, dgt.affiliate_id, dgt.active
FROM 
    deal_general_tariff AS dgt
  JOIN 
    tariff_data AS td
      ON td.affiliate_id = dgt.affiliate_id ;