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MelanieN2450's avatar
MelanieN2450
Copper Contributor
May 04, 2026

Documents based on template don't have correct styles

I'm sorry if this has been asked before but I've searched and either can't find an answer or can't understand the answers offered.

 

I'm doing some contract work for an organisation and documents related to the project I'm working on are supposed to be branded in a certain way, with a consistent font and headers etc. I've been struggling with trying to keep documents to stay with this formatting and not revert to other fonts and header styles. I thought I'd figured it out by taking one of their templates and saving it as a template on my computer and then basing new documents on this template. But it's still not working.

When I open the template, everything in the document looks correct, for example heading 1 shows as Avenir Book 12pt dark grey bold. If I click on that heading in the document text itself, it shows in the style box on the ribbon as heading 1. But if I take some text in the document and apply heading 1 to it, the font turns to Arial. For some reason, the styles showing in the ribbon are not the same as in the body of the template.

I went back to the original template on the organisation's share point, and it seems to be a problem there as well. However, the documents on the site and in the online version of Word are actually showing as Arial and not Avenir Book at all, despite the fact that the font box says it is. There is an exclamation mark in a yellow box beside the words 'Avenir Book' though, which makes me wonder if that font's not available in their system or the online version of Word. Perhaps the designer who came up with the branding has selected an obscure font which isn't available in the organisation. Could that have resulted in the styles becoming messed up? If that is the case, can I fix it?

As far as I can tell, I'm probably the only one who cares, because I notice things like font inconsistencies and I think nobody else has noticed that they are doing everything in Arial. But I would like to get things working correctly if I could.

 

2 Replies

  • Stefan_Blom's avatar
    Stefan_Blom
    MVP
    May 06, 2026

    Are users in your organization typically editing in Word online (SharePoint/OneDrive) or in the locally installed desktop Word app? 

    Using the desktop app whenever possible will ensure that formatting is consistent. 

    Also, in an incorrectly formatted text range, what is the result if you select the text and press Ctrl+SpaceBar (using the desktop app)? 

  • Doug_Robbins_Word_MVP's avatar
    Doug_Robbins_Word_MVP
    MVP
    May 05, 2026

    If you do not have the Developer tab displayed, go to File>Options>Customize Ribbon and on the right hand side, check the box for Developer.

    Then, on the Developer tab of the ribbon, click on the Document Template item and int the Templates and Add-ins dialog, uncheck the box for "Automatically update document styles"

    That box should normally NOT be checked as if it is checked, it results in the styles that are defined in the template being overwritten.