FAQs

Bleed
This is the 2mm border around your design that will be trimmed off when the card is cut to the final size. Its purpose is to make sure your design or image reaches right to the very edge of the cards, leaving no unsightly white edges.

If you're designing cards before you upload, you'll need to make your artwork 'Full Bleed' size to account for this. You'll find a list of 'Full Bleed' recommended sizes here, or we have a range of templates available for every product.

Trim
This is the final size of your cards, after the 'bleed' has been cut off.

Safety margin
This is an area inside the 'Trim'. Being 4mm smaller than your final card, the safe area is kept well away from trimmed away, and so this is where you should place your most important information or sections of your design. Anything outside of this area runs a risk of being cut off!

These are the formats we recommend:

• High resolution JPEGs for photos
• Print-ready, vector based PDFs for graphics or text
• Print-ready PDFs for for a mix of graphics and photography

Bitmap
A bitmap (e.g. JPEG, PNG, GIF) comprises of a thousands of tiny squares or 'pixels'. These pixels are all the same size, but can be in a huge range of colours. The amount of pixels shown in an image is called 'resolution'. When there are lots of pixels and an image looks smooth or photographic, that's 'high resolution'. When there are less pixels an image might look blurry or 'pixellated'.

If the number of pixels in the bitmap image is too low, they don't hold up well when zoomed in or enlarged. When you zoom right into one of your own images on screen, it will look blocky or blurry. The more you zoom in and less pixels are available.

Hence it is important to ensure that you use only 'high resolution JPEGS' - these have a large number of pixels available and will look smoother when printed.

Vector
A vector image is more adaptive and sophisticated for print: it uses X and Y coordinates to plot each point on a line or curve. This means that vector images are scalable and can be enlarged to billboard size while maintaining smooth edges.

Where possible, we recommend saving graphic designs, text and line art as 'vector based' PDFs. This is possible in applications like Adobe Illustrator, Adobe InDesign and more recent version of Adobe Photoshop. 

No, we do not recommend using thin borders or carefully centred content around the edge of the safe area.

We have a 2mm cutting tolerance, which means thin borders or carefully centred graphics can end up being slightly uneven and appear lopsided. The smaller the border, the more apparent the flaw.

To avoid potential disappointment, please use a wide border (which extends well inside the safe area) or remove it completely and making your design full bleed and borderless.

We adopt the digital halftone CMYK (cyan, magenta, yellow and black) printing process. This means we use small dots of these 4 inks to produce all colours. Our printer mixes and overlaps grids of these dots at varying sizes and distances from each other to create the illusion of tones.

Lighter colours will have fewer or smaller dots, as the paper showing through is what lightens the colour. The dots being further apart means they are more visible and can result in thin lines and the edges of shapes or letters to start to look broken when reviewed close up. 

Hence we recommend that you use thicker lines or strokes and darker colours whenever possible, as larger dots will be used to fill the white space of the paper resulting in a more consistent appearance.

The type of paper used for difference purposes is expressed in weight. In the countries following the European system, it is grammes per square metre (gsm or g/m² or simply g) and in the US system it is Pound (lb).

The paper used for writing/printing (letterheads and such stationery) is generally between 60 to 120 gsm (20 to 70 lb) and is called the paper or text stock. Anything heavier than this is considered the card stock, i.e. the paper used for business cards, postcards, greeting cards, etc.

Coated paper materials are available in two finishes:

• Glossy - shiny and smooth
• Matt - flat and lusterless

In short, glossy prints reflect light evenly while the matte finish is muted and non-reflective.

We have carefully curated the papers that we use, to make sure they are not only the finest available and also FSC certified to have the least impact on the environment.

There's a choice of premium paper and finishes for our business cards.

Premium laminated (coated) cards are thicker than most business cards, at 360 gsm / 16pt. The matte laminate has a 'satin' finish, and others, 'silk', while the gloss laminate dazzles with "high-gloss" or "shine".
 

Premium uncoated cards consist of crisp white and off-white card stocks. These cards are sourced from sustainable forests and is elemental chlorine free. They consist of:

• Q003 Ivory White
• Q008 Impression
• Q018 Porcelain

Premium textured cards consist of a variety of finely pebbled to rich grained, uncoated card stocks:

• Q005C Creme laid
• Q005W Classic Laid (white)
• Q007 Fine Grain
• Q009 Linen
• Q010 Felt
• Q011 Maple
• Q012 Crayon
• Q013 White Birch
• Q015 Linen
• Q020 Glade

Premium Metallic cards has a light coating to achieve a pearlescent and opulent feel, and at the same time guarantee very good print quality.

All our stocks are FSC certified for environmental friendliness

Our letterheads are available on two stocks.

• 100gsm woodfree which is a smooth, pure white paper. It's designed specifically for digital overprint.
• 100gsm laid (textured), slightly off-white paper that exudes a classy yet elegant feel.

You are responsible for reviewing your files and correcting any issues prior to placing the order.

shop.tommyprint.com.sg is not liable for errors in a final product caused by any of the following reasons:

• Spelling, punctuation and grammatical mistakes
• Low resolution or low quality graphics and images
• Damaged fonts
• Transparency issues
• Overprint issues
• Incorrect files uploaded
• Incorrect file orientation
• Artwork files that do not follow our specifications
• Colour deviation from the conversion of Pantone or RGB colors to CMYK
• Errors in user-selected options such as size, quantity, paper and finish
• Duplicate orders submitted by the Buyer
• Cracking on folds
• Cutting variances
• Incorrect, incomplete or undeliverable shipping address 
• Damage to products after delivery to the Buyer

CMYK  (cyan, magenta, yellow, key) is our preferred space. We do support RGB (red, green, blue) for producing digital and large format prints. We have accurately mapped color palette to match RGB to CMYK to ensure proper 4-color printing.

300 dpi (dots per inch) is the resolution of the output PDF file.

We use offset printing, which provides the highest quality of print material for both text and images.

It depends on exactly what you have ordered and the turnaround time options you have selected. We'll show you exact prices when you make your order, or when you input your options in our price calculator.

We have an online price calculator, so you can input your print requirement and select the preferred turnaround time. You will get an accurate estimate in seconds.

We'll then show you the different options available for different products, along with the price (including any bulk discounts) and the estimated turnaround time.

Also, when you place an order, we will email and text you via SMS an estimated arrival date - this is based on which product you've ordered and turnaround time you have chosen.

Yes. We will send you a text message and/or an email when your order has been dispatched. If you selected trackable shipping, we will also provide a tracking number and to the carrier's website.

Unfortunately we have stopped our retail operations and unable to accomodate self-collection at our production premises.

We aim to continue to our business as a full-fledged Singapore-based online print provider.

Any products being shipped to different addresses must be ordered separately.

As we have to pay shipping for every separate delivery, we can only offer bulk shipping discounts when multiple items are going to the same delivery address.

You can check your order status by going to the Order History section of Your Account.

If you chose trackable shipping, you can also track your shipment via the dispatch email received when your cards were shipped.

Please remember that our delivery estimates (listed beside your order and at checkout) are estimates, and subject to a little variation. Please be patient.

If your order hasn't arrived 5 working days after the estimated arrival date, please get in touch with us(sometimes the courier service can have a very busy week, and things can take longer than expected.)

Different print products have different production timeline.

Most items are dispatched from our production facilities within 4 working days, however standard namecards, items that require add-on finishing and bulk sticker orders will take longer .

If your order has been in printing status for more than 4 working days, something might have gone wrong. It is best to be patient, but if you simply cannot wait, please  let us know about the problem and we will sort it out soonest.

No, the price list indicates basic prices of products against the respective quantities.

The prices are calculated with regard to the most basic paper/card types, sizes and single side printing. As you know, the final printing cost depends on many parameters: paper/card weights or thickness, add-on glossy or matt finish, square or rounded corners, single or double side printing, quantity, turnaround time, destination shipping charges and the mode of transport.

Please use the indicative prices for calculating the basic cost. Once you place the order using the above parameters, you will be able to ascertain the final and exact cost.

Our Price Calculator allows you to enter your print requirements and you can get an accurate quote in seconds.

The cost of your order will depend on which product/s (and finish options) that you choose and where you are based. We also have various turnaround time options for some product so that you can choose the option that suits you best.

To use the Price Calculator, select your product finishing, add-on options (if any), quantity and shipping destination. Please note, delivery can often occur earlier than the estimated and that for the most reliable shipping, we always recommend trackable shipping.

If you would like a customised price/shipping quote, then please contact us and let us know the products you’d like to order, the quantity and the shipping destination. We'll happily provide all the necessary information.

Our payment gateway supports payment by Visa, MasterCard and Paylah.

Yes. Security is our top priority and we ensure that our payment gateway embrace the most up-to-date security systems to handle all transactions. 

We use third party payment processors to process payments made for products and services offered on shop.tommyprint.com.sg. All online payments will be conducted in accordance with Payment Card Industry (PCI) data security standards and your billing information is encrypted before being communicated to them. Subject to exceptions (please see our Privacy Policy), your credit/debit card details are communicated directly from your browser to these payment processors. This means that the payment form is either off-site or displayed in a frame on the payment page.

In short, your credit card information will NOT be stored on any of our computers or servers.

Yes, we do keep your name, contact details and a list of your previous orders to make it easier for you to reorder in the future.

For additional information, please refer to our Terms & Conditions and Privacy Policy.