Fax machine if only have internet service?

[jyl]

For my office, I have only internet and cellphone - no landline. I pay an online service $10/mo to have send/receive fax capability.

However, the number of faxes I send/receive has dwindled to a handful per year.

I'd like to dump the monthly subscription and just buy a physical fax machine that can somehow send/receive faxes over my internet connection using WiFi.

Is there such a thing? For cheap?

[LWJ]

Have you seen Office Space?

[Rick Lee]

I use FaxPlus. Can't remember what I pay, but it can't be more than $100/yr. It's all from my computer or phone. I probably send 30 faxes per month. I need it for the record keeping ability.

[masraum]

Back in the 90s I was able to scan docs on my PC and then send them to a central service that then sent the fax to the recipient. There's got to be something like that today.

[jyl]

You know, I feel dumb for even asking the question. I realized that it’s only $10/mo after all.

Ignore me and my fit of extreme cheapness.

[wildthing]

The handful of faxes, are they worth the $120 a year? Do they bring in 10x business?

[jyl]

Originally Posted by wildthing

The handful of faxes, are they worth the $120 a year? Do they bring in 10x business?

They are more a cost of doing business. But you make a good point. Suppose I simply don’t have fax capability: will I lose any business? Probably not.

I stopped answering my work landline; my vmail announcement says you can’t leave a message so to reach me, either send me an email or call my cellphone, and doesn’t give either. I figure if someone doesn’t know those and can’t figure them out or be bothered to check my website, then I probably don’t need to hear from them.

A similar philosophy could be applied to the fax.

[Rick Lee]

I have an app on my iPhone called TurboScan. I think I paid $5 for it one time six years ago. I use it at least 20-30x per week and it makes way better quality scans than any home printer.

[GH85Carrera]

My CPA is the only place I ever need to send a FAX. I killed my land line years ago. We just make a password protected PDF, and send info that way.


Today, we mostly think of the fax machine as an outdated piece of technology. While there are still some uses for it in an office-setting, technological advances are sending the fax machines to the same pasture as pagers, land-line telephones, and disposable cameras. Even if this is the last we hear of the beeps and bops that echo as an incoming fax is transmitted, the fax machine had a very long life – an amazing 171 years to be exact. Yes, the fax machine was invented in 1843, before the Model-T was even a dream, before the telephone was invented, and even before the American Civil War broke out.

[Rick Lee]

I have to use faxing all the time. I'm constantly canceling people's insurance policies for them and I need proof the request went through. Email doesn't work for that. When a company's fax machine sends an auto-reply that they have received my fax, it's hard for them to later wiggle out of it by saying they never got the fax. But they sometimes try, and so the fax log is important for countering that BS.

[rwest]

I have also heard that faxes are making a comeback as they are very hard to intercept, which makes them a good way to send sensitive information.

[911 Rod]

Faxes are required still for many lawyers as they are legally binding like Rick said. Emails are not.
Doesn't matter what happens at the other end if you have a fax confirmation.
My land line at work went digital and now the fax machine doesn't work. Going to landfill I guess.

[flipper35]

Simple VoIP converter for your fax? Most printers have fax/scanning built in and a lot can fax over internet now.