Preserve Text Formatting from Word to InDesign

Hi @riziharris ,

if you like to copy/paste from various Word documents also consider the RichPaste script by Marc Autret:

RichPaste | Copy and Paste with Minimal Formatting [UPDATE]

Marc Autret, April 06, 2016

https://www.indiscripts.com/post/2015/10/richpaste-copy-and-paste-with-minimal-formatting

Regards,
Uwe Laubender
( Adobe Community Expert )

Here I described my approach: http://kasyan.ho.ua/indesign/text/protect_local_styling/protect_local_styling.html

Mike's covered the basics, but an additional workflow/practice comment: If you are going to be cutting and pasting a lot of Word content from various sources, you will want to develop a consistent, meticulous workflow lest your project document end up cluttered with paste-in styles. It's unbelieveable how fast the junk from most (sloppy) Word docs can pile up, in Paragraph Styles, Character Styles and color swatches alone.

If the pieces are small, it may be most efficient to paste them in without ANY formatting attached, and quickly apply the ID document styles.

If the pieces are large, it may be most efficient to paste them into a work document with the same styles as the project document, clean it all up there, then cut and paste the result into your working doc. You can just abandon changes to the interim doc to keep it from getting too polluted.

And if you will be cutting material from the same sources, work to either set up matching ID styles or get the Word authors to use consistent styles and names to minimize the conflicts.

Also, as I always suggest as well, use a Word stage to clean up the text itself — spell check, remove all multiple white spaces (especially multiple spaces or tabs, or tab-spaces, and paragraph-space / space-paragraph combos)... this will reduce the number of layout headaches.

Word to ID is best done well, not fast. A few minutes getting a clean paste into ID will pay off in both the immediate and long run. You never want to depend on fixing everything up at some later step in ID.

A more thorough approach is to use the same style names in your Word document as you do in your InDesign document. 

Even more thorough is to File > Place the Word document, and turn on Show Import Options, and then spend the rest of the day happily experimenting with what to leave in and what to leave out and what style to merge into other styles.

But of course, you had stated that you only want a portion of the Word document!

InDesign > Preferences > Clipboard Handling > When Pasting ... tick on All Information and/or also Show Paste Options and/or also Show Auto Style option.