Working with Other People's Files

Written by Allen Wyatt (last updated October 30, 2021)
This tip applies to Word 97, 2000, 2002, and 2003

If you work in an office where Word is used, it is likely that you need to work with documents from other people. If you simply load up their document, then you have to put up with their formatting choices. This may be hard to do, especially if you don't like their choices in fonts or spacing. To overcome this, open a new file (based on the template of your choice) and insert their file in this new document. If there are any styles in their document that match names in your document, then your styles will take precedence. Thus, your formatting choices will be used, not theirs.

Note that this tip will not work if styles were not used in the original document. If the other person explicitly formatted text using the menus and toolbars, then the formatting they used will remain. To overcome this, you may want to select the entire document and reset it to the Normal style.

WordTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Word training. (Microsoft Word is the most popular word processing software in the world.) This tip (999) applies to Microsoft Word 97, 2000, 2002, and 2003.

Author Bio

Allen Wyatt

With more than 50 non-fiction books and numerous magazine articles to his credit, Allen Wyatt is an internationally recognized author. He is president of Sharon Parq Associates, a computer and publishing services company. Learn more about Allen...

MORE FROM ALLEN

Displaying Nonprinting Characters

Nonprinting characters are a great boon when you are editing a document. Turn them on and you can easily see what ...

Discover More

Viewing Workbook Statistics

Excel keeps track of a range of stats about each workbook you use. If you want to take a look at those stats, it's easy; ...

Discover More

Creating a Hanging Indent

One of the more common formatting tasks for paragraphs is to create hanging indents. This tip explains what they are and ...

Discover More

Learning Made Easy! Quickly teach yourself how to format, publish, and share your content using Word 2021 or Microsoft 365. With Step by Step, you set the pace, building and practicing the skills you need, just when you need them! Check out Microsoft Word Step by Step today!

More WordTips (menu)

Moving Quickly Between Directories

Want an easy way to move between directories using the Open dialog box? With just a little bit of up-front typing, you ...

Discover More

Opening Only a Merge Document

After merging the information from a data source into a document, you may decide that you only want to open the merge ...

Discover More

Formatting Text in Custom Document Properties

Word allows you to create custom document properties that stay with a document and can be inserted through the use of ...

Discover More

FREE SERVICE: Get tips like this every week in WordTips, a free productivity newsletter. Enter your address and click "Subscribe."

View most recent newsletter.

Comments

If you would like to add an image to your comment (not an avatar, but an image to help in making the point of your comment), include the characters [{fig}] (all 7 characters, in the sequence shown) in your comment text. You’ll be prompted to upload your image when you submit the comment. Maximum image size is 6Mpixels. Images larger than 600px wide or 1000px tall will be reduced. Up to three images may be included in a comment. All images are subject to review. Commenting privileges may be curtailed if inappropriate images are posted.

Notify me about new comments ONLY FOR THIS TIP

Notify me about new comments ANYWHERE ON THIS SITE

Hide my email address

What is 6 + 6?

There are currently no comments for this tip. (Be the first to leave your comment—just use the simple form above!)

This Site

Got a version of Word that uses the menu interface (Word 97, Word 2000, Word 2002, or Word 2003)? This site is for you! If you use a later version of Word, visit our WordTips site focusing on the ribbon interface.