Fortunately, though, if the document you are creating is one you use frequently or is something that's commonly used by businesses (a business card, label, letterhead, invoice, time sheet, or brochure layout, or even a website, for instance) you may be able to save hours of time by using or adapting a template that has been created by someone else.

In addition to saving time, using templates for frequently used documents such as invoices can help you avoid making an embarrassing mistake – like forgetting to change the dollar amount on an invoice. Starting a document from a template instead of opening a previously created document to copy will prevent you from accidentally overwriting the previous document with the new information because you forgot to change the file name.

A number of free templates ship with Microsoft Office, and you can find free templates for commonly used forms and labels on sites such as Microsoft, Avery, and HP.

You can also buy templates for forms, flyers and a wide variety of other documents. Sometimes, as with this template for an employee handbook, the template you buy will include sample text to use as well as formatted text.

You can create your own templates, too, by saving the document under a special name and calling it up when you need it again.
Microsoft makes creating and using templates easy in its Office suite of products. Once you've created a template you want to use, you choose Save As from the Office Button in Office 2007(or File/Save As in earlier versions of Office) and choose the template option. This will save the template under a special file extension (.dotx or .dot, depending which version of Office you are using.)

To open a template you've created with Microsoft Office, you go to the Office Button (or file/new menu in earlier versions) and choose NEW. That will bring up a window that lets you choose from templates Microsoft provides, or from your own templates.

In addition to invoices, some of the templates you may want to create to save time include your letterhead, a fax form, a memo form, labels that include your logo, expense reports, estimate forms, statements, proposals, and any document you use often.

Look here for more sources of business templates.

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