Editing and Proofreading: Bulleted Lists

What’s the Recommended Format for Dot Point Series (also called bullet lists and bulleted lists)?

We gave our Better Business Writing presentation at a non-profit organisation last week. The writers in the audience had questions about the correct way to structure bulleted lists (these are also called dot point series and bullet lists). This is an important editing and proofreading issue that comes up in many forms of business writing.

The following styles for bullet lists are recommended in the Style Manual for Authors, Editors and Printers. These styles are used and accepted by government departments and businesses throughout Australia. The Chicago Manual of Style, which is used in the United States, has different recommendations for structuring bulleted lists. If you’re writing for audiences or organisations outside Australia, you will want to research other conventions for bullet lists.

The first example shows how you structure a list where the points are complete sentences.

Example 1 – Bulleted Lists with Complete Sentences

The committee came to two important conclusions:

• Officers from the department should investigate the feasibility of developing legislated guidelines for future investigations.
• Research should be funded in the three priority areas.

You can see that both sentences are capitalised and have full stops (periods) at the ends.

When you have sentence fragments, as in the next example, you only punctuate the final point with a full stop. Since the points aren’t full sentences, they aren’t capitalised. Also, it’s no longer the common style in Australia to use semi-colons or commas at the end of each point.

Example 2 – Bulleted Lists with Sentence Fragments

The Style Manual for Authors, Editors and Printers gives the following example of how to punctuate bulleted lists when the bulleted points are sentence fragments.

Assistance is available in several forms:

• monetary assistance
• equipment or environmental modifications
• advisory services.

When you have sentence fragments, make sure they are consistent. The following example from a training manual we edited shows inconsistent bullet points.

Example 3 – Bulleted Lists with Inconsistent Structure

Carry out the following tasks by completing the appropriate reporting form to:

• describe what happened
• describe your concern
• reporting any action taken
• suggestions for future action.

The first two points are correct because they flow from the lead-in phrase. The third and fourth points don’t match the structure. After editing, all points fit with the lead-in.

Carry out the following tasks by completing the appropriate reporting form to:

• describe what happened
• describe your concern
• report any action taken
• suggest future action.

When a sentence follows a sentence fragment in a list to explain a point, you don’t put a full stop at the end of that sentence.

Example 4 – Bulleted Lists with Explanatory Sentences

Assistance is available in several forms:

• monetary assistance. Income support and specialist disability allowances fall into this category
• equipment or environmental modifications
• advisory services.

Although ‘Income support and specialist disability allowances fall into this category’ is a complete sentence, you don’t use a full stop until the end of the list.

The Style manual for authors, editors and printers gives more information on structuring dot point series (also called bullet lists and bulleted lists). If you do a lot of editing and proofreading (and live in Australia), it’s a good idea to get this book.

US readers should refer to The Chicago Manual of Style for recommended styles for bulleted lists.

We welcome your comments and suggestions. We’re happy to answer your questions on copywriting, business writing, speech writing, editing and proofreading.

Michael