How to adjust print to compensate for shift for labels

[DoYouLikeHam]

Hi. I'm trying to print labels using a template from Avery. Everything appears to be the right size... but there is a slight offset, so the designs are ending up shifted up and left on the label page vs where the labels actually exist on the page. 

i assume there are some print or setup settings somewhere.. I'd rather not move the content in the document. 

any suggestions as to what area to look into?

[Monika Gause]

CHeck the settings in the printer driver.

[DoYouLikeHam]

@Monika Gause   Can you be a little less vague?  What type of settings am I looking for?  Can you post a screenshot of what you would adjust on your end?

[Monika Gause]

I don't have the same printer as you. Probably the paper is not aligned exactly (or even cannot be aligned) in the printer. Or the prinbter introduces that in its driver somewhere. DO you have a documentation for that driver?

[DoYouLikeHam]

@Monika Gause after re-looking at my output.. it's not just shifted, its actually seems to be slightly overscaled and shifted.  E.d., the top/left label image is slightly above and to the left, and the bottom/right label is slighly below and to the right.  

The printer is an HP Office Jet Pro 8600.

From the illustrator print window "General" scaling is set to 'do not scale'

There is a Page Setup... button, that says "please use all print options from the Print dialog box".. when I click Continue, it shows scaling at 100%

Similary, there is a Setup... button that says the same.  Inside there , under paper handling, is an option "Scale to fit paper size" which is off.

The page size is set to US Letter Borderless, which is consistent with the physical label sheet.

The messages that Illustrator states about 'Setup...' and 'Page Setup..." seems to imply to use the settings in the Illustrator settings, instead of mucking in the driver settings... but you seem to be pointing in the opposite direction?

[Monika Gause]

If the other settings are set up, then they might interfere. Also it looks like you are using a Mac and Mac drivers are kind of an afterthought for printer manufacturers. Does it only look like it's off or is it really off? Did you measure the output?

[DoYouLikeHam]

I am not sure how anything I have set could cause interference. By having everything set as do not scale, I'd expect 1:1 output. Can you clarify?

i'm not sure what you are asking me if I measured. I can clearly see that the printed image is scaled relative to the labels themselves.

[Monika Gause]

So when you measure them on the printed sheet, the size does not match the file?

Illustrator does print the actual size. This is happening in the driver or the printer shifting the paper around. If nothing else works, you could do the math and then print with scaling. 

[DoYouLikeHam]

I did not measure. i assume the template from the label vendor is accurate. 

[Larry G. Schneider]

Try turning off "Borderless Printing". Most borderless is done by scaling up the output by a couple of percent to make sure that that it covers the page.