In the Find and Replace dialog box, you can remove a specific
character style: Place the cursor in the "Find what" box, click More,
click Format, then click Style and choose the style name. In the
"Replace with" box, specify the "Default Paragraph Font" style (in a
similar manner). Click Replace All.

But note that if the document has a lot of manual formatting, it would
be easier (although time-consuming) to start fresh with text only, and
apply styles to recreate formatting.

If you choose this method, you must start with printing a copy for
reference (so that you can recreate formatting correctly).

Then you can clear all direct font formatting (Ctrl+SpaceBar) and
paragraph formatting (Ctrl+Q) and continue from there,
applying/modifying styles as necessary. Alternatively, remove all
formatting (by applying the Normal style) and then apply styles.

--
Stefan Blom
Microsoft Word MVP


"Nimbus" wrote in message
...
Thanks Yes that would work if I manually checked through every line.
But
with a 100 page document rather labour intensive and I miss parts.
Is there
any way to do this automatically using search and replace or
automatically
update styles when opening document.

"Stefan Blom" wrote:

Selecting the text and then pressing Ctrl+SpaceBar clears any
formatting not in the underlying paragraph style (including
character styles).

--
Stefan Blom
Microsoft Word MVP


"Nimbus" wrote in message
...
I review documents from other sources and try to present in a
consistent style.
Some documents use character styles.
I can find no way to remove character styles except by deleting
the
style
completely or manually remove all formating using style pane
then
reapply
paragraph style.
Following do NOT work.
**Edit replace character style with para graph style -
Paragraph
style
changes but character style remains.
**Automatically update document styles when opening document -
character
style remains.
**Simply click on the new paragraph style in style pane -
character
style
remains.