WD2001: Word Appends an Extra Record to Data Merge Operation

In Microsoft Word 2001 for Mac, when you perform a data merge operation by using the Microsoft Office Address Book as your data source, and you specify a range of records to be included, Word may append an extra record to your data merge.

This behavior can occur if all of the following conditions are true:

• The Office Address Book is used as the data source.
• The Merge Data Range setting in the Data Merge Manager is set to Custom.
• The From and the To boxes in the Data Merge Manager are both set to 3 or greater.

This behavior does not occur if you include records 1 or 2 in the Merge Data Range setting (by typing 1 or 2 in the From or the To boxes in the Data Merge Manager).

NOTE: This behavior can also occur if you use the Office Address Book as a data source in FileMaker Pro.

To work around this issue, export the Address Book to a file, and then use the contacts export file as the data source for your data merge operation. You need to modify your file by using Microsoft Excel or Word before you can use the file as a data source. To do so, use one of the following methods.

Export the Address Book and Use Excel 2001 to Modify Your File

1. Start Entourage (or Microsoft Outlook Express), and then on the File menu, click Export Contacts. Name the file, and then click Save.
2. Quit Entourage, and then start Excel.
3. On the File menu in Excel, click Open.
4. Locate your contacts export, click Open, and then click Finish.
5. On the File menu, click Save As, and then in the Name box, type a new name for your contacts export.
6. Click Save, and then click Yes when the alert appears.
7. Quit Excel, and then click Don't Save when the alert appears.
8. Start Word, and then open your data merge document.
9. In the Data Merge Manager, click Get Data, and then click Open Data Source.
10. Locate the contacts export file that you saved in Excel, and then click Open
11. Click Insert Merge Field, and then select the merge field that you want to insert.

Export the Address Book and Use Word 2001 to Modify Your File

1. Start Entourage (or Outlook Express), and then on the File menu, click Export Contacts. Name the file, and then click Save.
2. Quit Entourage, and then start Word.
3. On the File menu, click Open.
4. Locate your contacts export, and then click Open.
5. On the Tools menu, click Show/Hide to display hidden text in the document, such as tab characters and paragraph marks.
6. Find the word "Interests," and then place the insertion point immediately after "Interests" but before the paragraph mark.
7. Press TAB to insert a tab character between the word "Interests" and the paragraph mark.
   
   The line should appear as follows:
   Astrology Sign (tab character) Interests (tab character)(paragraph mark)
8. On the File menu, click Save, and then close the contacts export.
9. Open your data merge document.
10. In the Data Merge Manager, click Get Data, and then click Open Data Source.
11. Locate the contacts export document that you saved in Word, and then click Open.
12. Click Insert Merge Field, and then select the merge field that you want to insert.

Microsoft has confirmed that this is a problem in the Microsoft products that are listed at the beginning of this article.

For more information about data sources and the data merge process, click the Office Assistant, type working with data sources in data merge, click Search, and then click a topic to view it.

NOTE: If the Assistant is hidden, click the Office Assistant button on the Standard toolbar.