You may want to send Health Check invites in the post, you can populate the invite letters using Mail Merge in Word.

• Open an existing Word document, or create a new one.

  • Click on Mailings in the top menu

  • Click on Start Mail Merge

  • Click on Step-by-Step Mail Merge Wizard from the drop-down menu

The Mail Merge pane will appear and guide you through Six Steps below.

Step 1:

• The Mail Merge task pane will be on the on the right side of the Word window

• Under document type: Click on Letters

• Under step 1 of 6: Click on Next: Starting document

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Step 2:

• Under starting document: Click on Use the current document

• Under step 2 of 6: Click on Next: Select recipients

  

Step 3:

You'll need an address list so Word can automatically place each address into the document. The list can be in an existing file, such as the file you downloaded from Skyline.

• Use an existing list will be selected as default

• Under use an existing list: Click on Browse or Select A Different List to select the file

  

• Browse to and highlight to the excel document you downloaded from Skyline and saved

• Click on Open

  

• Select Table will open: Click on OK

  

The Mail Merge Recipients will be listed, all are ticked as default. You can uncheck recipients if needed.

• Click on OK

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• Under step 3 of 6: Click Next: Write your letter

  

Step 4:

You’re now ready to create your invite letter template. When it's printed, the body of the letter will be the same; the only difference will the recipient data (such as the name and address).

Example Letter

Dear

We are writing to let you know that you are eligible for a free NHS Health Check.  Please contact the surgery to book an appointment as soon as possible.

Yours Sincerely

Practice Nurse

To insert recipient data:

• Place the cursor in the document where you want the information to appear.

• Click on More Items

• Double click on the field name or select and click insert

Note, it’s easier to insert all the fields you want in the letter first (won’t be in the right place) and then move them in the document.

Note, remember to leave a blank space at the top of the document if you’re using practice headed paper. You could also paste in the practice header into the template if needed.

You can also add a date

• Move the cursor in the document where you want the date to be inserted

• Click on the Insert tab in the Word menu

• Look across the menu for the Text section

• Click on Date & Time

• Select the date format you want

• Tick Update Automatically

• Click on OK

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Your template will now have the date populated

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• Under step 4 of 6: Click on Next: Preview your letters

  

Step 5:

The first recipient name and address will be populated into the letter. Note, if there’s blanks in the address, for example address line 4, this is because there’s no data in this field.

• Preview the letters to make sure the information from the recipient list appears correctly in the letter.

• You can use the left and right scroll arrows under Preview You Letters to view each document.

Note, at this point you may see that a certain filed is always blank, for example address 5 and may want to remove this from the template. You can do this by simply deleting the blank line.

• If everything looks correct, under Steps 5 of 6: Click Next: Complete the merge

Step 6:

• Under Merge: Click on Print to print the letters

  

• Decide if you want to print All of the letters, the current document (1 letter), or only a select group

In the example below we’ll print all of the letters.

• Click on OK - your invites should now be printing