Are you opening Word using a shortcut on the desktop, Start menu, or Quick
Launch bar or are you double-clicking on a document? If the latter, I would
expect the Save folder to be the one where that document is located.

--
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word)
Words into Type
Fairhope, Alabama USA
Word MVP FAQ site: http://word.mvps.org
Email cannot be acknowledged; please post all follow-ups to the newsgroup so
all may benefit.

"Jan G" wrote in message
...
Word 2003 - Even though I have chosen a particular path for the file
location under tools/options, when I open Word (for the first time) it
defaults to the last directory I was working in and not the directory I
have
chosen as the file location. How can I default to the desired directory
when
opening Word?