Mail Merge with a New or Existing Recipient List – Word Automatic Tables (Senior 3 ICT) | Ganzaa

Word Automatic Tables

Lessons

Senior 3 · ICT

Word Automatic Tables

4 lessons

Lesson 4 of 4

Mail Merge with a New or Existing Recipient List

50 min

One letter, 120 parents

The school is inviting the parents of 120 S3 students to a meeting about the national examinations. Each letter must greet the parent by name and mention their child and the child's class. Typing 120 letters would take days and would be full of mistakes. With mail merge, the secretary writes one letter, keeps the names in one list, and lets Word produce all 120 in a minute.

Definition

Mail merge: combining one main document with a data source to produce many personalised copies, such as letters, envelopes, labels or emails.

Main document: the text that is the same for everyone, with placeholders where the personal details go.

Data source (recipient list): a table of the details, one row per person. Each row is a record; each column is a field, named by its heading.

Merge field: a placeholder in the main document, shown as «Field_Name», that is replaced by that field's value from each record.

How the three parts fit

Diagram drawn by Ganzaa. Names are illustrative.

Merge fields must match the column headings of the data source. A field name cannot contain spaces, so a heading such as “First Name” is shown as «First_Name».

The Mailings tab, left to right

In Word for Microsoft 365 every step lives on the Mailings tab, and the buttons run in the order you use them.

Step	Button	What you do
1	Start Mail Merge	Choose the type: Letters, E-mail Messages, Envelopes, Labels or Directory.
2	Select Recipients	Type a New List… or Use an Existing List… (or Outlook contacts).
3	Edit Recipient List	Tick or untick people, sort, filter (for example Class equals S3 A), find duplicates.
4	Insert Merge Field, Address Block, Greeting Line	Put the placeholders into the letter.
5	Preview Results	See the real data; use the arrows to step through the records; Check for Errors.
6	Finish & Merge	Edit Individual Documents… (all letters in a new file), Print Documents… or Send Email Messages…

Prefer a guide? Start Mail Merge → Step-by-Step Mail Merge Wizard opens a pane that walks through the same six steps.

Option A: typing a new recipient list

Select Recipients → Type a New List… The New Address List window opens with ready-made columns (Title, First Name, Last Name, Company Name, Address Line 1, City and more).
Click Customize Columns…. Delete the columns you do not need, rename others, and add your own, for example Student and Class. Click OK.
Type the first record. Click New Entry for each next person.
Click OK. Word asks you to save the list: it is stored as a small Access database file (.mdb) in Documents → My Data Sources. Give it a clear name, such as S3_Parents_2026.

Option B: using an existing list

Most schools already keep names in a spreadsheet. Prepare it first: the first row holds the column headings, each record is one row, and there are no empty rows or merged cells. Then:

Select Recipients → Use an Existing List… and open the Excel workbook.
In Select Table, pick the worksheet (for example Sheet1$) and keep First row of data contains column headers ticked.
Open Edit Recipient List to check that the names came through, and untick anyone who should not get a letter.

Worked example 1: the parents' letter

The list S3_Parents.xlsx has columns Parent, Student, Class and Phone and 120 records. The letter reads:

Dear «Parent»,
The school invites you to a meeting about the progress of «Student» («Class») on Friday 6 November at 2 p.m. in the main hall.

Type the fixed text. Put the cursor after “Dear ”, then Insert Merge Field → Parent. Type the comma.
Insert «Student» and «Class» the same way. Type the spaces and brackets yourself: Word adds only the value.
Preview Results: the first letter reads “Dear Mr Habimana, … the progress of Aline (S3 A) …”. Step through a few records with the arrows.
The deputy head wants letters for S3 A only. Edit Recipient List → Filter: Field Class, Comparison Equal to, Compare to S3 A. Suppose 38 records remain: Word will produce 38 letters.
Finish & Merge → Edit Individual Documents → All. A new document, Letters1, holds 38 one-page letters, so it has 38 pages. Check it, then print.

Worked example 2: finding the fault

What the merged letters show	Cause	Fix
“Dear AlineUwase,”	Two fields inserted with no space between: «First_Name»«Last_Name»	Type a space between the fields.
The first letter is to “Dear Parent,” and one family is missing	The spreadsheet's headings were in row 2, so row 1 was read as headings	Move the headings to row 1 and choose the list again.
Every letter shows «Parent» instead of a name	Preview Results is off (the main document is still showing its fields)	Click Preview Results, or finish the merge.
Two letters to the same parent	The same record appears twice	Edit Recipient List → Find duplicates, untick one.

Warning

A recipient list is personal data. Names, phone numbers and children's details are protected by Rwanda's Law N° 058 of 2021 relating to the protection of personal data and privacy (see S2 ICT Unit 1). Use the list only for the purpose it was collected for, keep it on a password-protected account, do not email it around, and delete copies you no longer need.

Address Block, Greeting Line and Rules

Address Block inserts a whole address (name, street, city …) laid out in the usual order. It needs the data source's columns to be matched to Word's address parts; click Match Fields if any part is missing.
Greeting Line builds “Dear Mr Habimana,” from the Title and Last Name fields, with a fall-back such as “Dear Parent,” for records with no name.
Rules → If…Then…Else adds text that depends on a field. For example: If Fees_Balance is greater than 0 then “Please clear the balance before the meeting.” else “Thank you for paying your fees in full.”

GCFLearnFree (LearnFree): Word 2010 mail merge with the Step-by-Step Mail Merge Wizard. The version is older, but the Mailings tab and the six steps are the same in Word for Microsoft 365.

Tip

Using LibreOffice Writer? Tools → Mail Merge Wizard guides you through the same steps. To use a spreadsheet as the list, Writer first registers it as a data source; the wizard does this when you click Select Address List → Add.

✦

Hands-on: club invitations, two ways

New list. Start a new document. Mailings → Start Mail Merge → Letters. Select Recipients → Type a New List. Customise the columns to First_Name, Last_Name, Class and Club, and type five classmates. Save the list as Club_Members.
Write a short letter inviting each member to their club's first meeting. Insert «First_Name», «Club» and «Class» in sensible places.
Preview Results and step through all five. Fix any missing spaces.
Finish & Merge → Edit Individual Documents → All. How many pages does Letters1 have? Save it.
Existing list. In Excel, type the same five members with headings in row 1, add three more, and save as Members.xlsx. In a new letter, use Use an Existing List to connect to it.
Filter the list so only members of one club get a letter. Add a rule: If Class equals S3 A then “Meet in Room 4” else “Meet in the library”.
Merge, check every letter, and print to PDF (choose Microsoft Print to PDF as the printer).

Practice

Define mail merge, data source and merge field.
Name four kinds of document that mail merge can produce.
List, in order, the six main steps of a mail merge in Word.
What three things should be checked in an Excel sheet before using it as a recipient list?
A list has 85 records. The filter keeps only Class equal to S3 C, which has 29 records, and 2 of those are unticked. How many letters will be produced?
Merged letters read “Dear Mrs ,” for some parents. Suggest the cause and a fix.
Explain the difference between Edit Individual Documents and Print Documents in Finish & Merge. Why is the first often safer?
A teacher wants to send each student's exam results to their parent by mail merge. Evaluate this plan, considering both its benefits and the risks to personal data.

Show answersHide answers

Mail merge: combining one main document with a data source to make many personalised copies. Data source: the table of details, one record per row and one field per column. Merge field: a placeholder «Field» replaced by each record's value.
Letters, emails, envelopes, labels (and directories).
Start Mail Merge (choose type) → Select Recipients → Edit Recipient List → Insert merge fields → Preview Results → Finish & Merge.
Headings in the first row; one record per row with no empty rows; no merged cells (and the data is complete and spelled correctly).
29 − 2 = 27 letters.
The Last_Name field is empty for those records (or the greeting uses a field that is blank). Fill in the missing data, or use a Greeting Line with a fall-back such as “Dear Parent,”.
Edit Individual Documents puts all the letters into a new document you can check and correct before printing; Print Documents sends them straight to the printer. The first is safer because mistakes are found before paper and ink are wasted.
Benefits: fast, accurate, every parent gets their own child's results, easy to repeat each term. Risks: results are personal data; a wrong filter or a mis-sorted list could send one child's results to another parent; an emailed list could leak. A good plan: check the list, preview every record, send only the child's own results to the verified contact, and keep the list secure under the data protection law.

1One letter, 120 parents

2How the three parts fit

3The Mailings tab, left to right

4Option A: typing a new recipient list

5Option B: using an existing list

6Address Block, Greeting Line and Rules

7Hands-on: club invitations, two ways