Nice try Erik but did not work for me.

Maybe cmarti will have better luck with it.

Microsoft Knowledge Base Article - 210565
Word Startup (Command-Line) Switches and Their Purpose
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;210565

What you should be able to do is open the document, then select all, copy, open template, paste, save-as %n%.doc