Saving a Word 2007 template by default should’ve saved by default in the “Templates” folder right? No. Instead, I told the Microsoft Support technician that the default folder it saved into was whatever folder I saved my previous document in.

The technician then had me save the 2007 Word template to my Desktop, then cut and paste it into the “Templates” folder. I laughed and asked, “why is it when I’m saving a Microsoft’s Word 2007 template, that it doesn’t do what all the other previous version of Word 2000, XP and 2003 did. And that is to automatically take me right into Word’s “Templates” folder?

For those of you who want a quick answer, the Microsoft technician couldn’t even save his own Word 2007 template in the Templates folder by default either. Solution? The technician submitted it as a request by Microsoft to fix it, so you can wait until Microsoft fixes it and releases an update, but then the squeaky wheel gets oiled first so give Microsoft a call and tell them Kirt sent you

If you don’t know what a template is, or if you’re not of generation x, y and soon z, and have patience, then please read on… (I’m of generation x so this shouldn’t be too long except for y and z, I’ve probably already lost you).

In Word 2003 when I wanted to save a Word document into a Word template - a template contains elements (formatting like color, font, text, pictures etc.) that you want to automatically populate in your new documents, without having to recreate these elements every time. For example, on all faxes I create, I have to add in my: name, business name and contact phone. I don’t want to type that in every time I have a fax to send. So I create a very basic fax document with my name, business name and phone. I then can save it as a template in Microsoft’s Word 2003 “Template” folder by: File>Save As, /Save As Type arrow>Template.dot (Note: the moment in Word 2003 I select “Template.dot” Word 2003 automatically takes me to the “Templates” folder, and Word 2007 as of this blog posting date is broken and doesn’t do that. Instead you have to find your way to Microsoft’s “Templates” folder or, better yet pick your own to save them in), then name your template & /Save (b).

If you have Word 2007 see for yourself. /Office (b), /Word Options, /Advanced & scroll all the way to the bottom and /File Locations… (b), /User Templates and notice the default location it’s SUPPOSED to save your .dotx Word 2007 Templates in: C:\…\Roaming Microsoft\Templates, but it doesn’t.

Whew! Twinkie break.