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Why is it no longer possible to print readable hardcopy from online banking sites using Firefox - it cuts off bits or uses illegibly small font?nt

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When I try to print from one banking site using Firefox, it cuts off either the date on the left or the amount on the right; on another banking site, though the list of transactions is perfectly viewable on screen, when printed the hard copy appears in miniscule font which is unreadable. Unless something can be done about these shortcomings I shall be forced to use another browser for online banking, which I don't want to do.

When I try to print from one banking site using Firefox, it cuts off either the date on the left or the amount on the right; on another banking site, though the list of transactions is perfectly viewable on screen, when printed the hard copy appears in miniscule font which is unreadable. Unless something can be done about these shortcomings I shall be forced to use another browser for online banking, which I don't want to do.

All Replies (4)

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Hi herecomdejudge, does the site presesnt the list as part of a web page or as a PDF? Usually a statement is presented as a PDF, but recent transactions may be web content.

PDF

The reason I ask this first is, you can easily pop a PDF out to your regular PDF viewer (for example, Adobe Reader/Acrobat) for printing. That may give you better results because Firefox's PDF viewer converts PDFs to HTML and some fidelity may be lost in the process. To do that, use the "Download" button on the viewer's black toolbar:

<center></center>

Web Content

Does the page have a printer button/icon to generate a print-optimized view of the list?

If you use the menu to call up Print Preview --

  • "3-bar" menu button > Print
  • (menu bar) File > Print Preview

-- is the problem of oversized content visible there? Does it help to adjust the scaling on the bar?

<center></center>

A miniscule font could be caused by "Shrink to Fit" on super-wide pages. Manual scaling sometimes helps with that.

Sometimes Firefox might not be using the entire sheet of paper, and instead using just the upper left quarter of it, which means the page is only 1/4 of its normal size. This thread has the suggested steps to resolve that issue: https://support.mozilla.org/questions/1240808

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Many thanks. My problem has been with webpage content not pdfs. The webpage has a printer button, but that does not generate a print view. I have followed the steps in the support thread you gave a link to and that seems to have cured the problem at least on the one banking site I have tried to print on since. Peculiarly it only printed in black and white, not colour - maybe I reset something I should not have? but that is minor compared with the miniscule font I had before. Thanks again for your help.

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I too have noticed that basic functions that used to work, sometimes completely become unworkable, without warning. For example, on some banking websites, (using Win 10, Firefox 67.0.04) if you use the old key combination "Ctrl + P" to print something out provides unexpected and useless results, regardless of whether one prints to the printer or to a PDF.

The odd solution to that puzzle is, that Firefox downloads a PDF to your Downloads folder, which contains a workable copy, but Firefox does not tell you that it does that. Especially if you use the "background setting" called "Space Fantasy" ( dark blue, with some starry night pattern), the "Firefox downloads ARROW, which is WHITE when not in use, but turns DARK BLUE when it does something, and thus it pretty much disappears against the DARK BLUE "SPACE FANTASY" BACKGROUND. It's a thing they don't tell you about, and you have to find out for yourself. Typing white on white is just as invisible as typing black on black.

So, now, having learned that from experience, I often look in the "Downloads" folder, just to see if by happenstance something readable ended up there, even though I specifically intended to print to PDF to a different folder. It's always something.

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Hi I thought there was cake, websites can indeed intercept Ctrl+p and send you a download. If your Firefox is set to automatically save PDFs, that would explain why it did that on its own. By default, Firefox opens PDFs in a built-in viewer, which might be more distracting in that scenario than downloading them. However, if you want to give it a try: View PDF files using Firefox’s built-in viewer.