Posted by admin on Sunday, April 19, 2009 at 11:06 pm

Even after over a decade of fighting for the paperless office, the faxes remain. There are simply too many things that require a signature, too many hand-written notes, and too many hand-filled forms. So the fax endures, but not so much the fax machine. Online faxing, that uses your internet connection rather than a separate physical device, is growing in popularity. Dedicated internet fax services now boast millions of subscribers. Here are the top five reasons to reassign your fax machine to door-stop duty.

1.One less physical hunk of iron in your office. Even if desk-space isn’t scarce, you’ll appreciate not having to feed it toner and paper, deal with it jamming, or having to get it serviced.

2.Send and receive from anywhere. If you can get a ‘net connection, you can send a fax. Fax from the coffee shop or from home in your pajamas. There’s no need to make a special trip to the office or the copy store just to send a single page.

3.Alerts let you know when a document has arrived. You can be told via email or text message to your cellphone that you’ve received a fax. Know right away, wherever you are, that the document you’re waiting on has finally arrived.

4.Maintain electronic copies. Need a copy of that contract you signed three months ago? Internet faxes can be stored and retrieved just like your other digital documents. And with fax logs, you’ll be able to see who sent them, what their phone number is, and the result of the transaction.

5.Fax directly from your word processor. There’s no need to print out a document you want faxed. If your faxing service supports your word processing or number crunching software, you can send it right from your computer without even having to get up. It might not get you the paperless office of your dreams, but it will reduce the amount of time you spend shuffling papers back and forth.

Photo credits: Abhisek Sarda, anomalous4