Printing in a busy clinic is a common source of problems. A vet hits Print Label during a consult and the dosage label needs to come out on the dispensary's thermal printer, not the upstairs admin office. A receptionist prints an invoice and it has to land on the A4 laser at the front desk. Printing configuration is where you set those defaults so the right thing prints in the right place every time, and how you tune dosage label dimensions to match the actual paper rolls in your printer.
💡 In short: Go to Settings → Printing to set dosage label dimensions, the footer text on every PDF document, and connect Lupa to your physical printers.
Before You Begin
📍 Permissions required: Integrations Settings. Without it, the Printing sidebar item is hidden. Individual employees can still set their own printer defaults without this permission.
The page is focuses on:
Settings: Dosage label sizing, font and margin tuning, and the document footer.
Settings tab
Dosage labels
Dosage labels print every time you dispense medication. Each label carries the patient name, drug, dose, instructions, batch and expiry, prescriber, and a QR code linking to the dispense record. Configure the layout once for your label printer and stop fighting alignment forever.
Setting | What it controls | Range |
Width / Height (mm) | Physical label dimensions. Match your paper roll exactly. | Min 15 mm |
Top / Right / Bottom / Left margin (mm) | White space inside the printable area. Increase if text gets clipped at the edge. | 0+ |
Label Font Size (pt) | Size of the patient/drug header text. | 4–20 pt (default 7) |
Dosage Font Size (pt) | Size of the dosage instructions block. | 4–20 pt (default 7) |
QR Code Size (mm) | Side length of the QR square. | 5–30 mm (default 11) |
Preview QR Code | Toggles the QR in the live preview only. The QR still prints unless you turn it off in your label template separately. | — |
The preview pane on the right re-renders as you change values, so you can see clipping or whitespace before clicking Download PDF to test on real paper.
✅ Common starting points: 105 × 29 mm for standard Dymo-style address labels. 57 × 32 mm for compact dispensary rolls. 60 × 100 mm if you want extra room for verbose dosage instructions. Always test-print before a busy clinic day.
PDF document footer
The Footer Text field at the bottom of the Settings tab adds a single block of text to the bottom of every PDF Lupa generates including referral letters, consent forms, cash-ups, prescriptions, and any other PDF doc.
💡 The footer here covers general PDF documents. Invoices and statements have their own footer field on Settings → Financial Controls → Financial Document Settings that overrides this one. See .
Click Save at the top of the tab to apply your changes.
What Lupa prints
Lupa generates two paper formats, A4 documents and small labels.
Document | Format | Used for |
Invoices, statements, credit notes, refunds | A4 | Billing and accounting documents |
Referral letters, consent forms, certificates | A4 | Clinical paperwork printed for clients or other vets |
Cash-up reports | A4 | End-of-day till reconciliation |
Dosage labels | Label | Dispensed medication — sized via this Settings tab |
Client and address labels | Label | Posting letters, file labels, name tags. Print from the client record via Create → Print Client Label or Create → Print Address Label. |
Pet labels | Label | Identifying records, cage cards. Print from the pet record via Create → Print Label. |
Product barcode labels | Label | Inventory management — printed in grids of 30 per A4 sheet by default |
When you choose Print Client Label, Print Address Label, or Print Label from the Create menu, a submenu opens to the side giving you three choices:
Preview — opens the label as a PDF so you can check it before printing.
Download — saves the PDF to your computer.
Print to — lists every label printer configured for your practice. The effective default printer is marked. Picking a printer sends the job straight to the desktop print agent. If no default printer is set, Lupa opens your browser's print dialog instead and shows a message at the top of the screen — go to Settings → Printing to set a default.
Tips
✅ Best practices:
Test-print a real label after changing dimensions. Looks fine on screen and prints fine on paper are not the same thing.
Set practice-wide A4 and Label defaults, then let individual staff override per workstation if their use case differs.
Keep the desktop app updated. Printer drivers change, and each release improves printer discovery and fixes printing issues — particularly for custom label sizes on Windows.
Use the document footer for the boring legal stuff (registration number, terms-of-business URL), not for marketing.
Troubleshooting
Problem | Solution |
Save stays greyed out after clearing the footer text | Update Lupa to the latest version. An earlier release prevented saving once the footer had been cleared back to empty. After updating, clear the field and click Save as normal. |
Dosage label text is clipped | Increase margins by 1–2 mm and/or drop font size by a point. Confirm width/height match the actual paper roll manufacturers occasionally round. |
Wrong printer used for a job | Per-user printer defaults override the practice default. Check Settings → My Printer Preferences on the workstation that printed. If Lupa opened your browser's print dialog instead of sending the job to a printer, it means no default printer is set for that label format — you'll see a message at the top of the screen telling you this. Go to Settings → Printing to set a default and future prints will go straight to the agent. |
Printing tab missing | You don't have Integrations Settings permission. Ask your practice manager. |
QR code missing on printed label but visible in preview | The Preview QR Code toggle on this page only affects the on-screen preview. Check the QR setting on the dosage label template itself. |
Lupa Desktop shows "Can't reach Lupa" | Check that the computer has internet access. If the problem persists, security software or a firewall may be blocking outgoing traffic — ask IT to allow api.lupapets.com on port 443. |
Lupa Desktop shows a connection timeout message | A firewall blocking outgoing traffic is the most common cause. Ask IT to allow api.lupapets.com on port 443. |
Lupa Desktop shows a secure-connection error | Check that the computer's clock is set correctly. If your practice uses corporate security software that inspects web traffic, it may need to be configured to allow Lupa Desktop through. |
Lupa Desktop shows a "not authorised" or token error | The print token has expired, was never saved, or was pasted with an invisible trailing space. Open Lupa Desktop Settings, paste a fresh token from the Lupa web app, and save — Lupa automatically removes any extra spaces when saving, so re-pasting is usually enough to fix it. |
Lupa Desktop shows "server refused the connection" | If you recently changed the API URL in Lupa Desktop Settings, double-check it is correct. Otherwise security software on the computer may be blocking the connection. |
Labels printing on the wrong paper size on Windows | Update Lupa Desktop to the latest version. Newer versions show a fuller list of paper sizes in Settings → Printing, combining names from both the print driver and Windows — so custom label sizes such as DYMO 99015 Diskette now appear in the list and can be selected directly. If a size you previously chose stops appearing, it will still be shown so your existing setting is preserved. |
Lupa Desktop printed a label but it came out at the wrong size, and the Jobs tab shows a warning | If the paper size you selected isn't accepted by the printer's driver, Lupa Desktop retries the job at the driver's default size so the label still prints rather than failing outright. The job shows as completed with a warning in the Jobs tab. To stop this happening, open Settings → Printing and choose a paper size that matches what the driver expects — usually the size shown as the printer's default in Windows. If you're unsure which size that is, check the printer's properties in Windows Settings. |
Not all printers appear in the printer list | Update Lupa Desktop to the latest version. Newer versions discover printers from multiple sources and merge the results, so printers that were previously missed by one discovery method will now appear. |
Need to share log files with support | Right-click the Lupa Desktop tray icon and choose Open Logs Folder. Send the files in that folder to the Lupa support team. |
Frequently Asked Questions
Can different clinics in our group have different printer setups? {toggle="true"}
Yes. Tokens, printers, defaults, and label settings are all per-clinic.
Can I print receipts on a thermal receipt printer? {toggle="true"}
Receipts are currently generated as A4 PDFs. For thermal printing, you'd print the PDF scaled to your roll width or use the dosage label format if a tiny custom receipt suits your workflow.
What does the QR code on dosage labels contain? {toggle="true"}
A link to the dispense record in Lupa. Scanning it from a phone takes you (or a vet doing a follow-up) directly to the prescription, which is handy for re-dispensing or queries.