Word 2011 files converted to PDFs can't be merged.

I made them by using both the "Save As" command and the Print option of PDF.

The files aren't protected.

When I made the files using Word 2008, I had no problems.

I don't have Office 2011 but presume that it has the doc extension when saving Word files. Or is it something other than that? What if the document is saved first as Word 2008 (docx) or 2004 (doc)? Will the resultant files behave abnormally again when converted to pdf? Saving them in older formats might help. It could simply be that some weird encoding prevents Acrobat from merging files or the PDFs are not well encoded due to some subtle incompatibility with OS X PDF converter. On top of that, to ensure compatibility with a wider audience, saving in older formats also helps.

Both Word 2011 and 2008 save to the .docx extension. When saved to either they convert to PDFs without problems. The problem occurs afterwards when I try merging the files in Acrobat. The ones created from the Word 2011 menus, won't merge. The ones from the Word 2008 menus merge okay.

It's very strange, the PDFs look the same from the "Get Info" point of view.

Quote: "(NT) Could you try saving as doc and then create pdf?"

Not really interested in discovering workarounds.

I've since made a number of other observations:

1. The created PDFs are very different in file size. The Word 2011 created ones are up to 5 times larger in size.
2. When you select the option from the print window to save as an "Adobe PDF File," (further down the list of options) the Automator starts but stalls, failing to complete the creation of the PDF file.

Although I am not fond of that place, you might give it a shot because if they duplicate it, it seems to be a serious bug affecting many users. Concerning the "workarounds", this one is actually not a workaround. Many people still have older versions that do not recognize docx and need a converter. Converters are free but not 100% accurate by some accounts. So, in order to improve capability with other potential users, it would be better to save as doc as a default (very easy to set in a save as dialog box. If that works, I would not look back. After all, if you do not find a workaround, you may be stuck with a relatively useless program (may be no incentive to use it if you have Word 200.
A remote option would be to trash the Normal file or even reinstall Office (if you find on the forums that others do not have this problem).
Please keep us posted because this is an important issue. I am considering switching to 2011 but am not sure whether they cleaned up the bugs from 2008.
Do you ever insert a ppt picture into Word text box? If yes, do you need to only use paste special and select pdf like in Word 2008 (otherwise it would be fuzzy)?