Some of the elements listed above may be left out, depending on the nature of the report and the audience. For example, a letter of transmittal may be waived depending on the information in the foreword.

Reports that are long are normally bound on the left margin, so wide left-hand margins and right flush page numbers are appropriate. The opening pages (excluding the title page) are normally paginated with lowercase Roman numerals (i, ii, iii, iv, etc.), while the rest of the report is paginated with Arabic numerals (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, etc.).