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Corporate Style Guide

The City of Greater Dandenong Style Guide offers you an easy-to-use roadmap to Council’s corporate style and is a good starting point for any questions you have about communications and style.

It is a key tool to ensure all Council’s communications are professional, consistent and accessible.

Remember that all major external communications materials MUST be checked by Media and Communications. This included bulk mail outs, newspaper advertisements, reports, flyers, etc. Email news@cgd.vic.gov.au with or visit the office.  

Please note: The style guide is designed to be an electronic guide, rather than a printed document. The content is in alphabetical order where you can click on the letter that corresponds to what you are looking for.

City of Greater Dandenong Style Guide

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Top style tips

Below are some top style tips, based on the most commonly asked questions about Council style.

Australian English

It is Council style to use Australian English including:

  • ‘ou’ spelling - colour not color, neighbour not neighbor
  • ‘s’ not ‘z’ in organisation, realise, summarise, maximise, categorise, privatise, finalise.

Ensure your Microsoft Word online dictionary is set to Australian English.

Bullet points

Bullet points can be difficult to get right. The most important thing is consistency.

Refer to the full Style Guide for detailed information as there are a few variations.

Capital letters

Capital letters are only needed for proper nouns, and in some cases headings. Avoid the overuse of capital letters.

Dates

Dates should be expressed as a day, figure, month and year in that order 
eg Thursday 22 March.

The year is only needed if the event falls within a new calendar year or when it is an annual event.

When writing years use an en dash with no spaces between the years
eg 2012-13.

To use an en dash press ctrl – (the minus sign on the number pad at the far right of your keyboard).

Please note: a normal dash can be used on web-based text as the function to create a en dash is not available.

Font size

The minimum font size for Council documents is Arial 10pt. The recommended size for body text is 11pt.

The text 'City of Opportunity' in the logo should never be smaller that 15mm in length.

Numbers

Write out in full numbers one to nine. Use numerals for 10 onwards and above. Use commas in numbers 10,000 and above.

Avoid starting a sentence with a number higher than nine.

Referring to Council

Use 'Greater Dandenong City Council' when referring to the organisation.

Use 'City of Greater Dandenong' when referring to the municipality.

Council is a singular and you should always say 'Council is' (not 'Council are').

Time

Council has approved ways to refer to time:

  • time should be expressed using numbers
  • use a full stop to separate hours from minutes, not a hyphen or colon
  • no space between the number and the am/pm
  • avoid saying noon, midday or midnight
  • do not use .00
  • use a dash between times not the word to
  • pm and am should be in lower case
  • am and pm should be used in both numbers.

Correct use:

✓ 11am-1pm
✓ 3pm-4.30pm
✓ 7.30pm-8.30pm

Greater Dandenong City Council acknowledges the Traditional Custodians of this land, the Bunurong People, and pays respect to their Elders past and present. We recognise and respect their continuing connections to climate, Culture, Country and waters.