Stopping a Two-Word Phrase from being Flagged as an Error

Jason uses the phrase "under written" quite regularly in his documents. Word insists on flagging this as an error, thinking it should be one word. However, Jason's usage requires it to be two words, as in "applying only to vendors who are under written obligations of confidentiality." He can say "Ignore All" to the error, but that applies only to the current document. Jason wants Word to never flag "under written" as an error.

It is unclear exactly what Jason is seeing on his system. In testing, I could not reproduce the issue on my system. For instance, when I typed sentences that used phrases that could also be considered as single words—such as "under written" and "as cot"—Word did not mark them as incorrect. If I typed the phrase "S election" (referring to a type of corporate organization), then Word did flag the phrase, thinking I meant "Selection" instead of "S election."

I understand, as well, that "under written" may not have been flagged on my system because Jason could be using a different-language version of Word, or he could be using an older version of Word that doesn't use the Editor as implemented in the latest versions of the program.

On my system it was the grammar checker that marked "S election" as incorrect, not the spell checker. Presumably, it is the grammar checker that is flagging "under written" in Jason's case. (In the latest versions of Word, things caught by the spell checker are flagged with a red squiggly single underline, while things caught by the grammar checker are flagged with a blue double underline.)

How you handle spelling and grammar issues differs within Word, as well. You can right-click on a flagged grammar issue and choose "Ignore Once," but there is no "Ignore All." (Jason specifically said he could choose "Ignore All.") You can right-click on a flagged spelling issue and choose "Ignore," "Ignore All," and "Add to Dictionary."

If, indeed, Jason is seeing a spelling error, then he can simply choose "Add to Dictionary" and his issue should be solved—the spell checker will never again flag "under written" as incorrect. Further information along this line can be found in this WordTip:

https://tips.net/T13428

If, however, it is the grammar checker that is flagging the phrase, then things get a bit messier. Word includes dozens and dozens of settings for the grammar checker, and finding out which one is resulting in the flagging of "under written" could be onerous.

Instead, it may be better, in Jason's case, to simply format the phrase as "No Proofing." To do this, select the phrase, display the Review tab of the ribbon, click Set Language in the Proofing group, then choose the Do Not Check Spelling checkbox. If you prefer to use a macro to explicitly turn off proofing for phrases such as "under written" or "S election," the following will work just fine. Select the phrase, then run the macro.

Sub NoProofing()
    Selection.NoProofing = True
End Sub

WordTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Word training. (Microsoft Word is the most popular word processing software in the world.) This tip (12195) applies to Microsoft Word 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, 2021, 2024, and Word in Microsoft 365.