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From time to time I run into the same sort of problem.

I use document templates (even though they are inexplicably hidden in File / Options / Add-ins / change-the-dropdown-or-you'll-never-find-them ).

The specific template in use does have "automatically apply updates" checked.

I have a bulleted paragraph style, nb, with a left indent of 0.25 inch and a 0.25 inch hanging indent. When I close my document and reopen it, nb paragraphs show up with a 2.75 left indent, which makes them awfully hard to read in a table.

I go into the Style pane and modify nb, so that everything looks the way I want it to. When I save, close, and reopen, the 2.75 left indent reappears.

While writing this comment, I have gone through the entire cycle: reopened my document to find that Word has failed to preserve my changes; reimposed them by modifying the style from the style panel; saving the document; reopening it once again. Same failure.

I used to regard templates and styles as Word's chief virtues. They have become increasingly unreliable and endlessly frustrating. The document in question was part of work I submitted as part of a job application. If after nearly 30 years of working with Word (I started with the demo of Word 1.0 for DOS) I can't rely on it to do what I intend, I might as well use Google docs.