Print Quality & Replacements
Any book with a manufacturing defect gets replaced at no cost. You keep the bad copies and there's nothing to send back.
What We Replace
We reprint and ship replacements free for problems that came from our press or bindery, including:
- Blank or duplicated pages
- Pages bound out of order
- A spine printed noticeably off center
- Streaks, lines, or missing color that aren't in your file
- Binding that fails on a book that hasn't been forced open
- Books damaged in transit by the carrier
What Counts as Normal
These come with the process, and we won't replace a book for them:
- Small shifts in where the trim falls, which is why artwork needs bleed and why elements should sit away from the trim line
- Color varying slightly between print runs
- Printed edges looking narrower on the face edge than the top and bottom, because spine glue pushes the block out slightly and more bleed gets trimmed there
- A cover that curls a little, which usually settles if you weigh the book down flat for a while
Perfect binding also won't take being forced flat. The spine glue cracks. A book opened all the way back on itself can fail, and that's reader handling rather than a manufacturing defect.
Telling a File Problem From a Press Problem
Before reporting, open your digital preview and look at the same page. If the problem is in the preview, it's in your file, and fixing it means uploading a corrected file. If the preview is clean and the printed book isn't, it likely happened on our end.
Thin white lines along the edges of the digital preview are sometimes an artifact of how the preview image is generated and don't appear in print. If that's the only thing you're seeing, ask us before you re-upload anything.
Reporting a Problem
Open the order in your order history and use the Order issue button. You have 30 days from the date you placed the order, not from delivery. Include:
- How many copies are affected
- Photos of the problem, with a page number if it's in the interior
- For shipping damage, photos of the outer box and the shipping label
Keep the damaged books, the box, and the packing material until the claim is settled. We can't file a carrier claim without the labeled box.
Ordering a Proof First
Order one proof copy before the large run. It catches file problems, color that came out different from your screen, and spine placement, while you're still only paying for one book.