Common Mistakes

Common mistakes to watch for when proofreading:

Words that have been spelled wrong.

Homophones, or words that are pronounced alike but have different spellings and meanings, that have been used incorrectly; e.g., using "their" instead of "there" or the incorrect version of "to," "too," or "two."

Punctuation to ensure that commas, periods, apostrophes, and question marks are in the appropriate place. Also, check to see that words that should be capitalized have been. While checking what is there, you should also check to see if something is not there. It is possible to leave out a word that belongs in the document.

There are other areas that you will need to be aware of and watch for when editing and proofreading, such as using active and passive voice, using numbers, word overload, and using cliches.

Numbers. In addition to using the numbers in a date or phone number, you inevitably will include some other numbers from time to time. There are some rules that should be followed when using numbers in your documents other than dates and phone numbers. Those rules include:

Spelling out any number that begins a sentence. If the number is large and requires several words, then you should rearrange your sentence so that the number does not start it.

For example:
Six children left camp early because of having a cold.

There were 102 crayons in the box.

You should have numbers in decimals, fractions, time of day, amounts of money, percentages, scores, statistics, dates, addresses, and numbers followed by measurements or symbols. Two-word numbers should be written in numeral form. All plural numbers should be written out (e.g., the eighties were a time of pop music.)

Incorrect:	There were one hundred and thirty books on the shelf. She lived at twenty four Elm Street. 87 people lined up for the free immunizations. She is going meet us at twelve fifteen for lunch. The speed limit was forty five m.p.h. She earns five seventy five per hour.
Correct:	There were 130 books on the shelf. She lived at 24 Elm Street. There were 87 people that lined up for the free immunizations. She is going to meet us at 12:15 for lunch. The speed limit was 45 m.p.h. She earns $5.75 per hour.

When it comes to percentages, you will use the % symbol for business writing purposes. However, you will see percent often written out. Some people, like most journalists, follow the Associated Press guide to style, which requires that the word be written out instead of a symbol being used. You should also always use numbers for chapters, page numbers, volumes, and line numbers.

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