This is a FAQ. Frequently Asked Questions are answered in the Perl documentation which comes bundled with every Perl distribution. It can be browsed and searched using the perldoc program. Have a look at

perldoc -q 500 also known as

My CGI script runs from the command line but not the browser.  (500 Server Error)

My stab in the dark guess is that httpd, iusr, nobody or whatever does not have permission to read your Word document.

--
Regards,
Helgi Briem
helgi AT decode DOT is