Pesticide Registration

Critical PDF label specifications for electronic submission

Current as of June 2007

Refer to "Specifications for Text PDF Product Labels" for full description of all requirements for submitting labels in PDF format.

Feature	Specification	Comments
Conversion to PDF	PDF must be created directly from electronic source document. DO NOT SCAN PAPER LABELS (with or without optical character recognition).	Goal is to create a text PDF rather than an image PDF to allow for text comparison. Do not submit scanned label images.
PDF Version	PDF Version 1.4 or higher
Font Embedding	Embed all fonts When embedding fails: cancel job	Goal is to embed all fonts used in document to ensure correct formatting, appearance, and printing of document. It is recommended that the PDF be created on the same computer on which the original source document was created so the same non-proprietary fonts are available. Using the "when embedding fails - cancel job" option will make it obvious when font problems exist (often due to proprietary fonts). Do NOT use proprietary fonts.
Security	Do not use any security on the PDF. Do not encrypt document Do not require password to open document Do not require password to print or edit document	Goal is to enable EPA to compare PDF files, mark comments on PDF label, and print.
File Naming Convention - Product Label	Finished PDF text label file MUST use this file name format: [co#]-[prod#].[yyyymmdd][version].[optional-id].PDF where: [co#] = 6 digit company number part of registration number; use leading zeros so that field is 6 digits (dash) = mandatory dash symbol [prod#] = 5 digit product sequence number part of registration number; use leading zeros so that field is 5 digits; for new products which do not yet have product numbers assigned use "xxxxx" in this field (period) = mandatory field separator [yyyymmdd] = date of submission using 4-digit year; use leading zeros for month and day, if needed; note that order is year, month, day to facilitate simple sorting [version] = optional version identifier if needed to distinguish file versions with same date field; consider initial submission to be version "a" but do not include the "a" in the file name; if needed, the first version identifier used in the file name would therefore be "b"; use letters (b, c, d, etc); do NOT separate version from date with period or space (period) = mandatory field separator [optional-id] = optional descriptor; any additional useful information (reason for amendment, company's document identifier, product name, etc); can include several fields separated by periods if desired (period) = mandatory field separator PDF = mandatory file extension Note: use leading zeros to fill co#, prod#, and yyyymmdd fields (but do not use spaces)