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Expect the shop to rebuild your design in their own software rather than use your file as-is — even if you built it properly in Illustrator, even if you exported exactly what they asked for. This is standard practice, not a sign that something went wrong with your file.

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Why they do it

Color separation for their press. Your file’s colors have to be converted to whatever their specific press, ink set, or substrate actually uses. That conversion is easier and more predictable in a file their software built than in an imported one, and it is their job to get right, not yours. Regenerating the QR code at the correct size and quiet zone. Shops routinely prefer to generate the code from your data rather than trust a pasted-in image, so it renders at exactly the right module size and with the exact clear space their process needs. A supplied PNG has a fixed pixel size and only a two-module margin; a code they generate has neither limitation. Their production files are built for their equipment. Imposition, registration marks, bleed, and cut paths are set up the way their machines expect. Rebuilding is often faster than adapting someone else’s file to that.

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What they need from you when they rebuild

Not your source file, necessarily. What they need is:
  • A visual and a spec to rebuild from — a reference image of the finished piece, plus final dimensions, bleed, and the QR code’s minimum size and quiet zone.
  • The data file, one row per physical piece.
  • The QR code for each piece, or just its URL — the Full URL column is enough if their software renders codes itself.
  • Confirmation of which column is which. This is the one that gets skipped, and it is the one that causes wrong-destination batches.

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A worked example

One QRtub customer designed a plaque in Illustrator, then sent it to a print shop for a batch of unique codes. The shop rebuilt the design in their own software. What they actually needed from the customer was the visual and spec to rebuild from, the data file with one row per plaque, the QR code or URL for each, and confirmation of which column was which. The Illustrator file itself was reference material, not production artwork. The shop sent back a proof before running the full batch. The customer scanned the codes on that proof rather than just looking at them — which is the only way to catch a code that renders perfectly and points at the wrong item.

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When it is worth a question

Redrawing is normal. Two things are still worth confirming after they do it:
  • That the quiet zone survived the rebuild. Nothing should cross it, including a mounting hole or a laminate edge.
  • That the code on each piece matches the intended row. Ask for a proof of real records and scan them.