Do people still use fax?

[sjt]

I'm in the process of setting up my business, and looking at efax - it'll cost me £7.20/month, and just wondering - do people still send faxes, or is everything mostly done by email? I know I haven't sent a fax for years!

 

[ryanlundwebsolutions]

Personally i only use email, phone and IM. Depends what sort of business you have to be honest, alot of people still use fax but since i work on the web then most communication for me is done...well...over the net

 

I have my PC setup to send/receive faxes, it is a feature of XP if you haven't tried it.

I did have a plain paper fax machine setup, but had to disconnect it as I was sick of the garbage coming through it.

I do need a fax though, as I receive 1 per week from a customer who has little other technology.

 

[leemason]

Only e-mail for me. Don't have a fax facility anymore. The only time I needed to send a fax recently I just plugged a phone line into my laptop modem and sent it that way. I haven't needed to recieve a fax for years.

 

[JamieM]

Yeah some people still use fax, many retailers for example.

 

[cjd]

Quite a lot of people still use fax - particularly for contract stuff - ut rarely in volume which makes buying a dedicated fax machine a bit expensive.

We're just introducing a 2 way fax service (it costs a lot less than efax) - if you'd like to try it look here:

http://www.voipfoneuserforum.com/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=3269

 

[leemason]

Voip do a good service: http://www.voipfone.co.uk/PB_Free_Fax_To_Email.php

 

[dave_n]

we use faxes all the time for contract related documents.
Most govt/public sector tender changes are dependent on you having a fax!!!!

 

[leemason]

Voip do a good service: http://www.voipfone.co.uk/PB_Free_Fax_To_Email.php

Sorry, should have been Voipfone!

 

[Silky]

hi,
I used eFax for one month, it took another 3 to cancel. They got the message in the end when my bank took over ....

Personally I do everything by email or snail mail. I've sent only 1 fax in 8 months and no one has asked to send me one.

Silky

 

[Officebird]

When I set up I was looking for a snazzy phone that could sent text messages and had a record function. Whilst looking I found a fax machine that did everything I needed and was on special offer so I got that. I haven't actually used it for my business but I have had people coming off the street to get me to fax things for them, at a charge obviously. This is related to the type of business I am in though so I really do think it would depend on your sector.

 

[BusinessIdeas]

I never need to receive faxes, but have to send them very occasionally. So I bought a 2nd hand one off a car boot for £15, it works fine.

 

[mahutchinson]

Banks use them often. Get a fax to email number. They are available free.

 

[jim_gold]

It really is no problem having one sit on a VoIP line, so the marginal cost for us in nil. In fact, after 6 years ours broke down last month and we were quoted £80 for repair.
The prices are so low now we replaced it with a fax / colour scanner and I don't know what else for less than £50.
We keep it on as some people feel more comfortable faxing credit card details details over than sending via email, and don't have encryption.

 

[scrivs]

Fax in the bin. Got fed up with junk fax mail and using my paper and ribbon up. Just receive emails via computer and just delete the junk faxes.

Just wish I could invent a bit of software that would filter out spam faxes that I don't read.

 

[CISK]

Being parochial - dealing only with my area - the food sector, I cannot remember sending or receiving a fax from a food buyer in the last 2 years.

As pointed out earlier, scanning documents and e-mailing them as an attatchment is the easiest method.


http://www.tastees.info

 

[Write My Site]

I was about to post the exact same warning about Efax!

They kept insisting I hadn't followed their cancellation procedures (despite communicating the cancellation by every possible method).

Then, when I wrote to them to say my credit card company had agreed to raise an automatic dispute if they attempted any further transactions, I immediately got a response to say they had closed the account!

Steer clear of Efax everyone!

hi,
I used eFax for one month, it took another 3 to cancel. They got the message in the end when my bank took over ....

Personally I do everything by email or snail mail. I've sent only 1 fax in 8 months and no one has asked to send me one.

Silky

 

[Rhyl Lightworks]

Funnily enough, yesterday I was asked to send details of the business etc., to open a new account, by fax. He wouldn't accept email, although I know he has it set up as I've received several emails from him. I had to sign the form, so I don't know if this has anything to do with it.
Barrie

 

[StephenW]

Hi sjt

aql do a virtual fax service, £2 p.m. ex-vat. The geographic numbers also accept inbound SMS! The SMS can be sent to you by e-mail or HTTP etc.

Take a look here:
Email To Fax
http://aql.com/telecoms/site/email2fax.php
and
Fax To Email
http://aql.com/telecoms/site/fax2email.php

P.M. me for a free trial

Regards
Stephen

 

[Hillier Associates]

I set up around 4 yrs ago and have found that despite my best efforts there is still the occasional need to send or receive a fax, mostly the latter. However, as I tend to get less than 20 pages per month I use the free efax service (is this free offer still running?) and it works very well. I often need to forward documents on and I simply save the efax as a tif file and attach to an email.
Sending is more difficult and until now I have been able to share someone's fax m/c for the 2-6 pages I need to send per month. As I have moved into larger offices I intend to by a scanner/printer/fax m/c. Thus I can scan and email docs if I need to and I have a back-up printer and a back-up fax if the free efax service finishes. I will probably get a Canon Pixma Mx300 which is about £50 inc VAT. If you don't have a printer and think you may want to print larger volumes then consider a Mx520 or Mx700 as they have separate colour cartridges so cheaper to run. They will be around £95 and £120 respectively.

Short answer - make sure you have some sort of fax facility. You will definitely need to use it on the odd occasion and not having one partly makes you look less professional but also adds to stress and/or delay. For the money involved it's probably best to consider just biting the bullet and doing it!

Hope this helps and good luck.
Stephen

 

[Deleted member 30151]

I bank with the Abbey and to send money abroad this has to be done by fax, quoting a previously agreed password for each transaction. Works very smoothly.
Also - I send some attachments to the Inland Revenue by fax and this works very well - you know it has reached the right person and any repayments come out much quicker than sending info by post!

 

[ThePublisher]

I very occasionally get asked if I have a fax machine - I don't. I can't remember any occasion in the past 4 years I've been in businesses when it's caused a real problem not having one. Don't intend to get one now.

 

[kajdan]

Some company send its order by fax and as was mention before banks of course use it.

 

[firefly22]

Me too! All my communications are by email with attachments if necessary.

 

Use fax quite a bit especially in the electricall contracting business.

Earl

 

[mirage12]

yes..up to now offices uses fax in sending some documents and files.Even our offices use one..

 

[JackieC]

I have a fax service which I only use for inbound faxes. The faxes arrive by email into my normal Inbox. I get a separate phone number for the faxes - and that was the real saver - never having to make sure that the ansaphone answers the phone before the fax does etc. - separate number means no hassle.

I think it is from Faxtastic.

 

[cherigrover]

we still use faxes to receive timesheets from customers. our photocopier converts to email though!

 

[woodss]

I was asked to fax a signed NDA back the other day; i don't have a fax, but I assume most people have at least easy access to a printer, so I signed it, scanned it in and sent it over as a PDF. I also have my signature saved as a JPG so I can stick it into documents and do the same.

For me, paperwork is redundant since most of it is done on the computer anyway. I do understand the importance of filing though (for irreplaceable documents!)

 

[cjd]

Our new fax service is now live:

http://www.voipfone.co.uk/fax.php

 

[Sarac]

We have been trialling an online faxing service, we still have to use them sometimes despite the fact it's inconvenient. We therefore thought about the online option to reduce wastage of paper etc.
This one seems good (Myfax), we don't get spam and its easy to set up, cheap too so we may keep it after the trial

 

[Barretts-Selfstorage]

We mainly use e-mail but some customers still fax orders over to us.

 

[tlewis]

We have a fax machine but it's hardly ever used - once all of last year for business, but my GP will only accept repeat prescriptions if they're faxed.

 

[cjd]

We've just made a new web fax service which is still beta. You can now send a fax without even having a fax number, let alone a fax machine. Info here:

https://www.voipfone.co.uk/fax_out.php
(you need to have an account to see this link atm)

Couldn't be easier really:

1. Compose your fax message - include a covering sheet if you need one - and save it on your PC.
(If you use Word 2007, please save your fax as a Word 97-2003 document)
2. Enter the full fax number into the box below. (Include the full international code if you are sending it to a non-UK destination.)
3. Use the browse button to find your document and ‘open’ it to attach it.
4. Press the ‘Send’ button.

Costs 10p per page.

 

[deniser]

We have a cheap £40 plain paper fax machine but with no ink in it as we only use it for sending, not receiving. I tell everyone we don't have one so no-one tries to send us anything and we certainly don't get any junk mail.

We use it for the following:
1. sending payment details to USA suppliers - they will only accept fax confirmations of card details
2. completing new supplier credit forms - again, in the ragtrade which is way behind any other sector, some things are only accepted by fax
3. when a customer makes multiple attempts at ordering online, the bankds set aside their money for authorisations, they then have no money to spend and the banks will only accept a fax from us to return the money to the customer's account
4. when you need to get a letter to someone quickly - usually something official with a time limit - when email doesn't work

It's just useful to have it but for our benefit, not for anyone else's.

 

[sunny09]

In reality, there are still many people use fax. But more and more people use email, phone, scanner. So if you do an enterprise, i think you'd better prepare a fax.

 

[scologic]

we signed up to efax 10 years ago when receiving was free. we've kept the same service and number for all these years and not paid a penny to get faxes incoming.
As a business we lasted 4 years before we had to buy a machine for outgoing. since then we've moved on to a scanner copier all in 1 mono printer but i think to date we've only ever invested around £150 on fax machines and service over the past 10 years.

And to think of all those companies we told to use the service.....

i dont know if YAC(your always connected) still accepts faxes. outgoing service fromYAC was always expensive tho...

Sco Logic