Thanks for the quick reply Mr Martin.

I have seen Mr Dog888's code but it is too bespoke/specialized for my application. I need a more integrated function like yours.

I have seen this at the MS site

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/243844/en-us

which doesn't hide the Spell checker quite as well in Vista

It is visible in the taskbar however and so it just needs one to click it to reveal it. Not too bad a problem.

I will use your error checking etc to check for the presence of Word and also produce a msgbox to tell the user when the spell check is complete.

Thank you for your help Mr Martin. I have rated you