Printing Outside the Boundaries All the Time

Written by Allen Wyatt (last updated May 28, 2024)
This tip applies to Word 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, and 2021

When Stephen chooses to print something, Word warns him that what he is trying to print is "outside the printing boundaries," but he can still print. Stephen wonders if there is any way to tell Word that he always prints outside the boundaries so that he doesn't always have to deal with this notification.

There is no way to turn this notification on or off—in other words, it is not a configuration setting you can make in the program. You can, however, turn off notifications while running a macro. This means that you can print via a macro, and simply turn notifications off just before printing and turn them back on right after printing. You do this using the DisplayAlerts property:

Application.DisplayAlerts = wdAlertsNone
Application.DisplayAlerts = wdAlertsAll

The first line turns off alerts and the second turns them on. It is important to remember that these lines are always used as a pair. If you turn off alerts and never turn them back on, you won't see any alerts even after the macro is ended.

A simple way to use them in a macro is shown here:

Sub PrintMyDocument()
    With Application
        .DisplayAlerts = wdAlertsNone
        .PrintOut Background:=False
        .DisplayAlerts = wdAlertsAll
    End With
End Sub

In order to use the macro, simply load the document you want to print and then run the macro. You won't see the notifications appear.

Note:

If you would like to know how to use the macros described on this page (or on any other page on the WordTips sites), I've prepared a special page that includes helpful information. Click here to open that special page in a new browser tab.

WordTips is your source for cost-effective Microsoft Word training. (Microsoft Word is the most popular word processing software in the world.) This tip (7594) applies to Microsoft Word 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, and 2021.

Author Bio

Allen Wyatt

With more than 50 non-fiction books and numerous magazine articles to his credit, Allen Wyatt is an internationally recognized author. He is president of Sharon Parq Associates, a computer and publishing services company. Learn more about Allen...

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