The printer f'd up!

[G-Man79]

I'll keep this short cause I'm swamped. We recently sent off a nice twenty page book for a client to a print house. Full color, saddle-stitched, the whole nine. My supervisor and I proofed it to death and when we sent it, it was flawless. We got it back yesterday (after days and days of run around from the print house rep) and there's a good amount of text formatting issues. These errors were not on the proof we signed off on. I'm positive these mistakes were done on their end. What's done is done I suppose but I refuse to take the fall for this if the client notices. ARGH! Needless to say, thise printer won't be getting any business from us again.

[D-Zine]

That sucks...What kind of file did you send the printer?

[G-Man79]

Pagemaker. I gave them all of the native files as well (fonts, eps, etc.). And to add insult to injury there was some color shifting on a few pages as well. Hello!?! What are we paying you for!?

[morea]

well if the proof was right and the printed product was wrong, the fault lies with the printer. Can you just ask them to reprint the job at their cost?

[G-Man79]

I could ask them but I doubt they would. The job was over $6K. We'll see what happens when I talk to my supervisor about it.

Thursday is the new Monday.

[Patrick Shannon]

Likely what happened is that perhaps when the Pagemaker documents asked for fonts, they used their own fonts instead of the ones you supplied, assuming that it was okay. Hence the reflow.

But even if two fonts are the same name and make, they can sometimes be different. I always use the client's fonts they supply even if I happen to have the same ones, you never know. Thus, it's the printer's fault, of course.

As far as color goes, if it's really, really critical and in the case of CMYK, it's recommended to send a color match/proof.

[clicky2]

Why wouldn't they reprint?

$6k? If that's a "big" job for that printer then I'm assuming you're dealing with some local "mom and pop" operation. Most printers I've worked with wouldn't even bat an eye at reprinting a job like that if the fault truely lies on their end.

[G-Man79]

They gave us a color proof and even that was off. I printed a one-off for them so they could see what we wanted and the colors were still off on a few pages which is weird because the mismatched colors and correct colors all had the same CMYK values. And we gave them all fonts used within the publication. At the end of the day it certainly doesn't ruin the publication but it's not the super sexy homerun we thought it would be. C'est la vie.

[LavaMan]

We screwed up a customers job once and lets just say the s*it hit the fan. Some lady came flying up to the reception desk threatining to vandalize the front of the shop because we werent listen to her needs or something like that I wasn't really paying attention.

[D-Zine]

because we werent listen to her needs or something like that I wasn't really paying attention.

that is like the funniest thing I have heard all day lava!! LMFAO!!!

:p

[PrintDriver]

"Match my printout" is not an excuse for not getting a proof from your printer. Did you spec PMS colors? CMYK is not CMYK the world around you know. Even in 4-color world, I'm finding. Definitely not in wide format.

$6K is not a very large job in my book. If you have a galley proof, they should have matched it. If you don't, it'll be tough to get a redo.

Patrick is probably right on the fonts.

[paulrandfan]

You made a twenty page book in pagemaker!!? That alone deserves a reward. I won't touch that program with a ten foot pole. I don't know that many printers around here that will work with Pagemaker anymore.

[DonnaL]

We take pagemaker files but cringe when we get them.
When we get artwork from someone else - be it a PDF file, we ALWAYS, no questions asked, send them a proof before print and 9 times out of 10 the designer or customer has a change.

[CatintheHat1]

You made a twenty page book in pagemaker!!? That alone deserves a reward. I won't touch that program with a ten foot pole. I don't know that many printers around here that will work with Pagemaker anymore.

I used to lay out a major broadsheet newspaper with PageMaker (my section - which went from 1 - 120 pages, depending on the features). It was owned by Aldus back then. I could operate that program in my sleep. I still have it somewhere on a stack of floppies..LOL.

Cathi

[G-Man79]

I suppose since I've been using Pagemaker for so long, it doesn't seem like a big deal to me. I am aware (and am in the process of making my bosses aware) of how using outdated software can lead to problems like the one that started this thread. But just like the wheels of justice, the wheels of upgrade approvals turn slowly.

[style]

i really feel for you.. that is just THE worst... when a job gets botched up through no fault of your own!!!! hope u can sort something out with the printer