The rise of email has reduced our dependency on the fax machine, but faxing still remains an important form of electronic communication for many groups. Most often, a fax is used to distribute press releases, send non-digital documents or sometimes for one-time transmission of documents to parties who don't have access to email.

There is no "magic bullet" solution for faxing, but by appropriately applying several different techniques for sending and receiving faxes, the online organization can realize considerable cost and time savings.

Fax machine

The keystone of any organization's fax system should be a fax machine. Having a standard fax machine is essential to most organizations, as they often need to fax documents with signatures, or other original documents not generated on their computers. A plain paper fax machine is preferred as it's output of received faxes is much nicer than thermal paper faxes. However, a thermal fax machine can be had for half the price and with the recent proliferation of Internet based faxing services, it may be all that you need.

Internet-based faxing services

In the past few years, a number of companies have begun offering fax services over the Internet. While the exact details of various Internet fax services differ, the concept is as follows:

Your computer sends the content of your fax as an email message to a computer operated by the Internet fax service. This machine then converts your email into a fax and sends it to the destination fax machine(s). Receiving faxes through this type of service is pretty much the same, only in reverse. A fax is sent to your fax number (assigned by the service, and quite possibly not a local number for you) where a server converts it into an image file and forwards it to your email address as an attachment.

Internet-based faxing, particularly broadcast faxing, has several advantages over faxing from a fax machine or from a modem attached to your computer.

1) Internet based faxing works over your existing Internet connection, and does not require a dedicated modem or phone line. This alone can save you $20/month or more.

2) Internet-based broadcast faxing does not tie up your computer for the duration of the broadcast fax; all you send is a single email message--the Internet fax service's computers do the rest, and provide you with a complete report of successful and unsuccessful faxes. A

3) Receiving faxes in an electronic format is resource efficient and makes forwarding faxes via email easy.

4) Internet-based faxing, is usually cheaper, especially for in-state long distance faxes.

Here's a quick rundown on some of the leading Internet fax services.

J2 also offers an inexpensive and rich set of services, including online faxing, online conference calling, and more.

eFax also offers good Interest faxing services, with a bit more of a consumer focus. ONE/Northwest has used efax for several years as our primary fax number, and have been very satisfied with their service.

Both of these companies have very similar products and pricing models.

Summary

Any small office that has a dedicated fax line or does a lot of broadcast faxing should strongly consider moving to Internet-based faxing as its primary fax tool, possibly retaining a regular fax machine on a non-dedicated line. You will save money, time and frustration by sending and receiving your faxes online, especially if you're dependent on broadcast faxing for media outreach.

The only substantial disadvantage of moving to an Internet-based fax infrastructure is the inevitable change to your organization's fax number. Internet fax services do not yet offer local numbers outside of major urban areas, and even when they do, moving to Internet-based faxing always involves changing your fax number. While this can be a bit of an administrative hassle for high-volume fax users, we think the long-term cost savings are often worth the short-term hassle.

Another consideration is the fact that if you're outside Seattle/Portland/Vancouver, using Internet-based faxing to receive faxes means that your fax number will be a random long-distance call away. If you receive most of your faxes from folks outside of your hometown, it's not a big deal, but if most of your incoming faxes are local calls, then it may be a concern.

Overall, though, we think the benefits of Internet-based faxing--convenience, reliability, cost savings--generally outweigh the short-term administrative hassles in most circumstances. Of course, you'll have to be the final judge.

For more information

J2: http://www.j2.com/

eFax: http://www.efax.com.