Word TAB INDICATOR missing

Anonymous
2014-05-14T08:16:58+00:00

The TAB INDICATOR now shows only as a blank icon and no tabs show on the ruler. My tab indicator and tabs were fine until recently. Running Word 2013 on Win 8. How can I fix this, please?

Microsoft 365 and Office | Word | For home | Windows

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Jay Freedman 208.3K Reputation points Volunteer Moderator
2014-08-21T21:24:31+00:00

The fix for this bug has been released as KB2883058 as part of the August 2014 updates. If you have Office 365, the fix will be included in the August automatic updates; otherwise it will appear in the August Patch Tuesday downloads in Windows Update or can be obtained from the link above.

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Stefan Blom 353.5K Reputation points MVP Volunteer Moderator
2014-07-27T16:27:39+00:00

There is an issue causing tab stops and indent indicators to disappear from the ruler in Word 2013. The problem is being investigated by the Office team, and a fix is expected. Meanwhile, the following are workarounds recommended by Microsoft:

  • Start Word first, with a blank document, and then open the document you are going to read or edit.​
  • Avoid having a table as the first item in a document (at present it appears that this is the cause of the problem).

While other procedures may clear the problem temporarily, none is a permanent fix, and they do not address the underlying problem issue.

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  1. Anonymous
    2014-06-07T12:24:13+00:00

    I have a Lenovo and just started experiencing the exact same problem. I can see the tab markers only when a blank document was previously and still is opened. Yesterday, I changed the background to the Windows 7 default and this fixed the problem ... but only temporarily, as this morning the tab markers had disappeared again. I've just reinstalled Word 2013 64 bits -- that's all I can this off.

    Seems to me as a Microsoft bug...

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  2. Anonymous
    2014-06-07T00:34:41+00:00

    Hello Stefan, the remark of Brook Nusz applies to me ! I experienced the problem on a document which starts with a table...

    So it looks like, "if the first document that I open with Words, is normal text, then no problem. If the first document which is opened with Word starts with a table, then the tab marks are gone"

    Yes, indeed, this seems to nail it. No problem when opening a new, blank Word document, but insert a table, save it and reopen it, and boom! No tab indicator. The original problem document I reported also started with a table.

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  3. Anonymous
    2014-06-07T00:27:36+00:00

    I too just started having this problem on disappearing tab markers. It started for me a couple of days ago, just after my version 365 did an automatic update. I can only get my tabs back by doing a theme change in windows 8.1. This is a pain, as I write manuals and every time I restart Word, yep those tabs are missing, and thus I have to do another theme change.

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