Every day matters

When people think of proofreading, they often picture long reports, novels or website copy. But there’s one category of content that quietly slips through the cracks. At first glance, proofreading calendars and diaries may seem simple. After all, what can go wrong with a few dates on a largely empty page? But as a proofreader, I’ve come to realise that there’s a whole minefield of potential problems:

• Spellings of months and days – particularly when distribution will be across different countries and there are foreign languages involved

• Incorrect days or dates – not all months start on the same day or have the same number of days, and don’t forget leap years

• Date sequences – repeated or missing numbers are more common than you’d think, and can throw off the entire calendar

• National holidays or featured dates of note – especially important in international editions or specialist publications

• Diaries have even more potential traps, such as day numbers, week numbers and even times of day, not to mention the ‘important information’ often found at the front.

Proofreading calendars and diaries isn’t just about spotting typos. It’s about ensuring accuracy, usability and professionalism in a product people rely on daily. When you’re printing 10,000 copies, a second set of eyes could save you from some very public mistakes and some very expensive printing re-runs.