Aiming at solving the problem of lack of common criteria for performance estimate and fair comparison of different text watermarking algorithms, this paper presents a fair watermarking benchmark for evaluating the performances of Word text watermarking. The benchmark focuses on evaluation and comparison of the most important watermarking attributes -- robustness and imperceptibility. First, the general framework of digital watermarking system is described. Then, the necessary parameters for proper benchmarking and the rating criteria for text visual quality measurement are analyzed and identified. Moreover, the paper surveys some popular image watermarking benchmarks and uses them as references to propose a new attack classification and attack pattern specialized for of Word text watermarking systems. Finally, the proposed benchmark is used to evaluate the performance of different text watermarking algorithms. The experimental results illustrate that the fair evaluation and comparison of watermark performances between different methods are efficient and reliable.