Does Anyone Still Use A Fax Machine?

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launderess

launderess

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Quiet Please, There´s a Lady on Stage
Time to begin spring cleaning with an eye to rubbish much of what isn't used.

Disconnected fax machine because quite honestly haven't sent nor received one in over a decade. Am thinking about just rubbishing the thing as there doesn't seem to be much of a market for them any longer.

Could keep it stashed for those odd "just in case" events, but that is how one already is stuck with far too much surplus to requirements.
 
I'm guessing that if you haven't used it in over a decade that you likely will never use it again. Unless it ends up being one of those things you need for the first time in ages the day after you get rid of it. LOL

I know there is enough demand for faxes that there are still places where one can go to send a fax in my area, although I don't know how much use any of those services get. It's entirely possible that those services only linger because they have the equipment already, or need the equipment for other purposes. The library, for example, has fax service, but the fax machine is built into the public photocopier. Since the fax ability is built in, why not offer it to the public for a fee? It might not bring in much, but who knows...enough faxes get sent, and maybe they can afford an extra book.
 
I haven't used one in about 5 years, and that was only because my old employer didn't have a scanner, but I had fax to email. Only way to get documents to my email address without taking a picture of them.

Probably 10 or 11 years ago I had a customer just rip me a new one because I made a comment along the lines of "Who uses faxes any more? Email is faster and more secure." He came back a few days later and just laid into me about how many new fax machines were sold, how many faxes were estimated to be sent annually, this that and another. He said I made him feel old and out dated, and behind the times. (This was a man who refused to give up his old Nokia 3586 candy bar style phone when smartphones were starting to take hold.) I stood by my statement, and asked how many of those fax machines were sold for use outside of Japan (for some reason they at that time used them A LOT) and how many of those fax machines were sold as part of a multifunction printer, and aren't actually sending faxes? Got told off. And then written up the next week.

I don't feel bad about what I said. Long story short, no one uses faxes anymore. If a business only wants to send you faxes, they are behind the times.
 
Fax built into my brand-new router/VoIP system

I signed up with a new ISP and I was really surprised when the router arrived, a device made by Fritz! Box in Germany, that it contained an ability to fax.

It has all the usual gigabit ethernet ports, latest in Wi-Fi protocols and also has handy repeater plugs that actually work really well to create a mesh network but the telephony side of it is really full on.

It has 1 analogue port for an existing phone and provides the usual dial tone, caller ID and so on.
But it also supports 6 DECT cordless phones and a built in telephone directory which is shared between all the handset and also used for Caller ID on the analogue one - so any numbers it recognises in the address book come up as name + number.

Various fancy routing / call handling options too so you can use multiple VoIP providers for different types of calls, different countries, or route them manually by picking from a menu on your phone or using a prefix.

It even has its own built in voicemail system!!

and the bit I don't think I'll be using : a fax server. So if you setup a VoIP account for the fax number, it will send and receive faxes (delivered to a preset email address). I tested it out and it faxed straight through to the virtual fax server at my office and received a fax no problem at all all over VoIP.

Also has a built in media server and you can even stream DVB-T (terrestrial digital european tv) or its cable version (DVB-C) through the box to any smart TV connected to it. My Samsung TV immediacy spotted the media server and made it available.

Really cool little device to play around with but I can't imagine too many households wanting a fax number, maybe some very small offices. They're still somewhat used in weird instances in medical office and the legal profession although it's kinda dying out rapidly as there are secure email services now for the health system and legal purposes.
 
Believe it or not, but most hospitals and nursing facilities still use fax machines on a daily basis. When info is needed right away going to the right people who need a hard copy of patients info they still go this route. They can have it in their hands, getting it directly from the nurses station without having to go to a computer downloading it then printing it out. This all takes time and sometimes you don't have the luxury of waiting around. Old outdated but there is still a need and purpose for these machines.

Jon
 
I used a fax machine countless times every day when I worked at a hospital. I used it to fax admission orders to central admissions, medication orders to the pharmacy, discharge information to the post-hospitalization physician, and entire charts when transferring patients to higher level hospitals. That was almost six years ago since I left that job but I have friends there so I know they’re still using faxes just as much. My children’s pediatrician also uses faxes to send absence excuses directly to the school and probably countless other things I don’t even know about. I’ve also had to fax paperwork to the HR shared service center for the USPS because there was some complications when I tried to put my husband on my health insurance plan and they needed additional information that they only took by fax. I also know our post office has one though I don’t know how frequently it gets used. As for keeping a fax machine at home, I don’t see the need and would chuck it if I had one laying around. You can always go to a copy, print, ship store to send a fax for very little money.
 
At work, they still use faxes but only for sending between locations, not usually for clients.

Here at home, my HP printer/scanner/copier has a fax function, but I've never used it.
 
It's interesting that this has come up!  Either the NYT or Wa Post had an article about this in the last month.  They found that fax machines are used more now--this year than the past several years.  It's often clearer technology than emailing documents and it gives you a response to the send.  I'll work to find the doc!
 
The printer that we had before our current printer had fax capability. I have been on the board of our HOA since 1995 and there are times when faxing documents to the management company is the fastest and easiest was to conduct some of our HOA business. I miss the fax! I can scan and send some of these items via email, but it is a way more complicated, time consuming method than the simple, quick fax transmission was.

And I’ve recently noticed when looking at ads for printers that many are now offering fax capability again, so maybe I’m not the only one that misses the convenience of sending a quick fax when necessary. And when I was still working, we used faxes in the Human Services Dept. all the time. Since I retired in 2005, I imagine that may have changed since I left. But there were many times that faxing helped to expedite my job, and allow me to help those in need of assistance more quickly.

But if you really don’t use the fax or foresee any future need for it, then get rid of it.

Eddie

Eddie
 
Fax has largely been replaced now by a secure and verified email system for healthcare here. There were data protection issues raised around the use of fax as you can't verify who's receiving it - often ending up on some reception desk or landing in a virtual fax system.

It's clearly not incompatible with VoIP though given how well it worked when sending documents with my router's built in fax services over a totally VoIP based system. So I don't think the notion that VoIP will kill fax is really true at all.

The bigger issue is that production of fax machines seems to be very niche. Outside of a few hangers on, I don't see faxes being used by the mainstream of business anymore. I mean how many businesses even publish or maintain a fax number these days?

Telex / teletype had a few diehard users in the financial world that clung on to it until the bitter end too.
 
I meant to add that unlike telex / teletype fax will continue to exist as it doesn't need any specific infrastructure - it can be transmitted over VoIP fairly easily and you can even do IP fax (FoIP) so it's obscure but not dead or likely to be entirely killed off by the closing down of TDM based telephone networks.

Telex / teletype rewired a whole specialist network of dedicated switches and so on. Fax is a very simple protocol that runs on top of existing technology and can be easily adapted to an all-IP network.
 
I've had fax-capable printers for decades. However, I was rarely able to get them to work properly. It was literally faster and easier to run down to Staples or other such place. As time went by places started accepting documents through email or text.

However, I do have an on-line fax account. I signed up, made a nominal deposit, and now have a permanent phone number to send and receive faxes. No equipment other than online access necessary.

I have found that some places only have fax as an electronic connection to the outside world. A local courthouse refused to acknowledge payment of a parking ticket despite proof of payment having been sent and signed for multiple times. They had no email, just fax and phone. A sympathetic clerk told me to fax "everything I have" to her office. I had three fax numbers for the court so I sent each of them "everything I had". Each of the three numbers got an 83 page fax from me! That solved the issue.

So my advice is to establish a permanent e-fax account and ditch the machine.

Jim
 
I work in healthcare revenue cycle management, and believe-it-or-not we still fax quite regularly! We no longer have actual fax machines as our phones and fax capabilities are all VOIP these days.

Emails are not HIPAA compliant unless they are securely encrypted, but faxes are considered to be HIPAA compliant. Many entities with which we work (including our Medicare contractors) will not accept emails as it creates too much hassle to integrate those secure emails into their workflow. Therefore they will only accept faxes or snail mail. Certain insurance companies (particularly United Healthcare) will demand that we send medical records before they will pay certain healthcare claims. Just the other day we had to snail mail 295 pages of medical records to them for them to pay the physician’s services on a claim where the patient was in skilled nursing for 65 days. Our VOIP fax was having system issues and we needed to get that claim paid, so we mailed them. And we wonder why healthcare is so expensive!
 
We use fax daily at work

It is more difficult to protect PHI (Protected Health Information) with emails that can be intercepted on the web. With a fax, you have a reasonable expectation that it is reaching the destination with a correct fax number.
 

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