Sounds like your default template is being overwritten, this sometimes happens - mainly on Work Machines! If Word sees the standard Template as being corrupt - or if it gets renamed or deleted (sometimes Anti-Virus sees that it has been changed and so deletes it) - Then Word creates a new template using the factory default settings! (the bugger!)
A
sort-of fix is:
- Open Word
- Close the open document (leaving word open)
- File > Open
- Change Files of type to Document Templates (*.dot)
- Navigate the open Dialogue to C:\Documents and Settings\**YOUR USERNAME**\Application Data\Microsoft\Templates
- Open Normal.dot (check that it says Normal.dot - Microsoft Word in the document name at the top of Word)
- Set all the options you want in your document
- Save
- Go to the Default Template folder
- Copy the Normal.dot template and save to somewhere you will remember
Next time your settings seem to have disappeared:
- Close Word
- Go to your saved copy
- Right-click and Copy
- Go to C:\Documents and Settings\**YOUR USERNAME**\Application Data\Microsoft\Templates (You could even create a shortcut to the folder in the same place that you keep your backup Template to make it quicker to get to!)
- Paste (Yes to overwrite)
- Open Word
As you see, not really a fix, as such, but it does the job!