# I ran into this problem today and found some helpful code snippets here. 
# However, I use Word 97 and there is a bug in the program which prevented 
# files from being saved. I found the workaround in the ActiveState 
# documentation. I thought people might find the code snippet helpful:

###############################
# Convert incoming word file to plain text
# USAGE: a full path file name needs to be provided
#     eg c:\\dir\\file.doc

use constant TRUE => 1;
use constant FALSE => 0;

sub WordToText
{
my( $infile, $outfile) = @_;

use Win32::OLE qw(in with);
use Win32::OLE::Const 'Microsoft Word';
$Win32::OLE::Warn = 3;            # die on errors...
my $Word = Win32::OLE->GetActiveObject('Word.Application')
    || Win32::OLE->new('Word.Application', 'Quit');

my $WordFile = $Word->Documents->Open("$infile");
if(!$WordFile)
   {
   print "WordToText did not create WordFile object\n";
   undef $Word;
   return FALSE;
   }

$Word->{Visible} = FALSE;
$Word->WordBasic->FileSaveAs( $outfile, 2); # '2' is text
$WordFile->Close( );

undef $WordFile;
undef $Word;

return TRUE;
}