Word Intermediate Lesson 5: Mail Merge Rules, Skip Records and Rupee Formats

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📘 Word Intermediate Course · Lesson 5 of 8

A collections letter to five dealers: skip anyone with nothing outstanding, and change the wording for accounts more than 60 days overdue.

IF rule

Mailings > Rules > If…Then…Else: Field name Days, Comparison Greater than, Compare to 60, then the two texts. The resulting field code (Alt+F9):

{ IF { MERGEFIELD Days } > 60 "This account is overdue." "Thank you for paying on time." }

Skip records

Rules > Skip Record If: Outstanding Equal to 0. Or filter in Edit Recipient List. In our test Word produced exactly 4 letters from 5 dealers, and the two accounts at 92 and 61 days got the overdue sentence.

Rupee formats: Word’s limit

A numeric picture switch like { MERGEFIELD Outstanding \# "#,##,##0.00" } looks right but Word groups in thousands anyway: we got 1,850,000.00, not 18,50,000.00. The reliable fix is to give Word text that’s already formatted. Add a column in Excel:

=TEXT(D2,"[>=10000000]##\,##\,##\,##0.00;[>=100000]##\,##\,##0.00;##,##0.00")

Name it without spaces (OutstandingINR) and merge that column. The letters then show 18,50,000.00 and 1,25,000.00.

Practice

Download the practice document below: the task list is at the top, the content to work on underneath. Then compare with the finished main document and the merged letters.