If I change the leftpadding in the first cell of the first row, the whole table moves horizontally on the page by the amount of the padding change. This occurs no matter how the leftpadding of the cell is made - using the menus, or by a macro instruction. Changing leftpadding of any other cell does not have this effect.

Is this a bug in Word or is there some reason for it?

Hi kae,

That is by design. All Word versions from at least as long ago as the early 1990s have behaved the same way. Changing the right padding likewise affects the right-hand end of the table. Essentially, what's happening is that the table border positions adjust to allow the text to start/end at the page margins (though paragraph indenting can affect that).

__________________
Cheers,
Paul Edstein
[Fmr MS MVP - Word]