Why Fax?
Perhaps, like me, you urgently want to communicate with your Senator or Representative, but you are tired of busy signals when you call, and the Pony Express isn’t fast enough. You may email, but you worry that something as insubstantial as light on a computer screen will be ignored. (Well in truth, your fax recipient may only get an email in the end, but at least fax is generally underused compared to email.)
Enter the fax machine. But, you say, “it’s 2017, and I’ve never even hooked up the multifunction printer to a landline, how can I send a fax?” What follows is a brief and undoubtedly incomplete survey of traditional and online faxing options that I collected to satisfy my own curiousity. It’s not intended as a howto— you won’t get setup instructions for your HP MFC. But I hope to make you aware of communication options.
Other than curiosity and a bit of research, I have no connection whatsoever with the products and services mentioned below.
The old fashioned way
Actual physical fax machine or multifunction printer connected to a POTS (plain old telephone service) line. Disadvantages: Long Distance charges apply. And you must actually have a telephone line. In many cases you must have a physical copy of the document to be sent. Advantage: You can fax handwritten documents, including signatures. Nothing says “concerned constituent” like a handwritten message. Another advantage, and this isn’t trivial if you are sending sensitive information, your fax will go point-to-point over the carrier; you aren’t handing it off to another third party delivery service.
Slightly less old fashioned way: A Windows computer — even including Windows 10 — with an internal or external modem, a land line, and the built-in Windows Fax and Scan software. This isn’t going to be a tutorial about installing the modem and setting up the software, but I will mention that a USB faxmodem is a lot easier to install than an internal card. Something like this $20 USROBOTICS softmodem www.usr.com/… will do the job (softmodem means it’s a dumb device, and the fax signalling is performed by software in your computer). A (more expensive) controller modem www.usr.com/... does a lot of the work internally and consequently doesn’t use as much of your computer’s resources. Be aware, you may be paying long distance tolls when you fax with a computer faxmodem.
Mac users are out of luck; modem support pretty much isn’t available on Macs since the ancient times of Mac OS X 10.6.8
Fax over VOIP. Maybe you don’t even have a landline anymore or you want to avoid long distance charges. Amazingly, you can send a fax with Windows Fax and Scan over Magic Jack or a similar Voice Over IP service.
And now, what you’ve been waiting for
… even if you didn’t know it. A short list of internet faxing services, including free services:
The most interesting entry is Fax Zero. You will see a couple of options for free and almost free faxing on the front page. They seem to be encouraging people to use their service to fax Congress. They even list congressional fax numbers and have statistics about who is getting faxed through faxzero. No word on whether those faxes are from conservative or progressive voters.
Another faxing service is at http://www.myfax.com/ They offer a 30 day trial; if you don’t cancel, you’ll spend $10 a month. And they have a totally free option: https://www.myfax.com/free/. You can send a couple faxes every 24 hours with this free service.
Ring Central offers a free trial; up to 750 pages at12.99 a month annual plan, or 14.99 month-to-month https://www.ringcentral.com/plansandpricing/ringcentralfax.html
Metro Fax, www.metrofax.com. Their 30 day free trial gives you 500 pages at $7.95 per month or 79.50 annually.
Online Faxes https://www.onlinefaxes.com/: 500 pages a month, $2.99.
Other Interesting articles
http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2385681,00.asp. A PC Magazine article rating fax services in 2016. It appears that eFax, Send2Fax, and MetroFax may all be the same company
Verizon Wireless, about faxing from your cell phone. Basically you will be using an app or going to a web page. A cell phone ‘line’ is not the same as a POTS line.
Share and Enjoy
No doubt this subject has been as dry as the little dessicant packets in your cell phone retail packaging, but now you know more about one way to manifest the voice of the people. I’ll be working all day, so I may not be around much. And in truth, unless someone can point to other free fax services, or wants to correct misinformation, I don’t expect there is a lot to discuss.