Indentation styling tips

While indentation is often used to denote subsections, we recommend not doing so for any document to be uploaded onto the Find Case Law service. The parser can struggle to differentiate and so make all headings indented.

Example of incorrectly formatted headings and subheadings

Evrythng Ltd v Cyrus Gilbert-Rolfe [2023] EWHC 7 (Comm)

Example of incorrectly indented headings in MS Words
At first glance this heading and subheading look correctly formatted in Word.

Though the indentation of the subsections looks fine in Word, when sent through the parser both the heading and subheading become indented:

Incorrectly indented headings displayed in web view
The indentation of the subheading has not come through the parser.

Headings and subheadings should therefore be uniform in alignment. If you are keen to have a difference between these two content groups, we recommend using styling (e.g. italics or bold) or labels (e.g.1.1, 1.A etc.).

Example of how to correctly format headings and subheadings

Candey Ltd v Crumpler and another (as Joint Liquidators of Peak Hotels and Resorts Ltd (In Liquidation)) [2022] UKSC 35

Indented headings using an italic font
Italics has been used effectively here to denote a subsection within a segment of the judgment.

To amend indentation you can go into the Layout section in Word:

MS Word layout menu view interface
Using the Word layout menu to control document indentation.

As you can see, a 1cm indent has been applied. If we remove this, the subheading will be flush to the margin just like the heading:

Correctly formatted subheading in a web view
The subheading now sits flush to the margin in web view.