Forum Discussion
Indenting in numbered list has gone haywire
My office uses custom Word templates that are updated to a legal software site, populated with an intake form through the same site, and then downloaded to our individual computers to edit as needed. The templates mostly use legal numbering under the Normal style. On Tuesday February 3, everything was working fine when I put my laptop to sleep. The next morning, I opened a Word document that I had downloaded from the legal software site and edited a week or two previously, and the formatting and indentation of the numbered lists was suddenly completely wonky. I had not changed any settings from the end of one day to the beginning of the next to cause this issue. In addition, I am the only one in the office of five people to be experiencing the problem. I contacted tech support, and the support person walked me through fixing the styles settings, and when that did not work, they uninstalled and reinstalled the entire Office suite. That also did not solve the problem. I'm completely stumped here; why would this issue suddenly arise with no input from me and also only affect my version of Word? And why didn't reinstalling the application fix it??
Details of the formatting issue:
Normally, the numbering should look like this
FIRST
1.1 The text goes to the right margin of the page
and then wraps so that the second line is indented by the same amount.
1.1.1 The first sub-paragraph begins at the indentation of the text in the first paragraph
1.1.1.1 The second sub-paragraph starts the same way, etc.
Now it looks like this:
FIRST
1.1 The text begins closer to the number and goes to the right margin, then
the second line is not indented to begin at the same point as the first line.
When I click on the leading number (e.g. 1.1), some of the text jumps over to the right slightly. When I try to use the markers on the ruler to adjust the indentation, the text doesn't move at all.
In addition, I can open a document, not mess with the wonky formatting but change something else, for example remove a watermark, then save and close the document, and one of my colleagues can open the same document and not have the formatting be messed up.
Please help!
3 Replies
First, Word jargon. You are dealing with a "multilevel" list. This is different from a "numbered list."
Second, version 2512 introduced some problems with multilevel lists and paragraph separators. Do you have a machine running version 2511 with the problem?
Resources:
- How to create numbered headings or outline numbering in Ribbon Versions of Word by Shauna Kelly
- Automatic Numbering in Word - my 5-page pdf
- Number Alignment by Suzanne Barnhill, MVP
This is a user-to-user support forum.
Microsoft is not hearing about your problems from what you post here. You are discussing a problem with your fellow users here. We can give good advice about how to work with Word as it is and give suggestions for making it work properly.
Designers and their supervisors do see feedback. (You will almost certainly not get a direct response to that feedback but they do see it.)
Here is more about that:
I suggest using the public feedback portal so other users can see your feedback, comment and vote. If you want, you can post the URL of your feedback with your question here to lead others with the same problem to your feedback. Be the “squeaky wheel” that gets fixed!
We are all having the same kind of issues where I work. It has been going on for several months for us. Our IT department said the issue is on Microsoft's end. I hope they fix it soon!
Take a look at the links provided by Charles Kenyon.
