Cut Expenses With An Online Fax Account
The commercial fax machine is closing in on its 50th birthday
. It has been refined and revised and updated in myriad ways to perform faster, be more dependable and render better and better images. Its evolution is analogous to that of the telephone, which hardly resembles the models of 1900 but works on the same principles. That is the sign of a robust technology, the fact that it evolves and improves while still using the original concept. Fax technology is decidedly robust.This is not to say that the fax machines itself is the pinnacle of the species. Online faxing technology is even faster and dispenses with the machine completely. However, it is what we might term a bridge technology, in that online faxing (the newer) builds a bridge to fax machines (the older) so that people without the Internet connections required for the former can still communicate with people who still use the latter. There are huge regions of the world where the Internet is either non-existent or is much more difficult to access that a simple, old-style phone line. Still, the more people who move to online faxing, the more people will enjoy the benefits of this bridge and its lower operating costs.
Obvious and not-so-obvious savings
Some of the obvious ways you will cut expenses with an online fax account involve the equipment itself. You have to buy a fax machine, first of all, and then as you use it, you have to replenish the so-called consumables like ink or toner, paper, the drum inside, etc. If your business does a lot of faxing, you already know how much this can cost. If you have an older model fax machine and are not ready to make the switch to online faxing (although you should be ready by the end of this article), at least you should leave the thermal-paper model behind and get a plain-paper fax. Better yet, many low-cost office all-in-one devices incorporate fax machines, although the ink-based ones, as opposed to lasers, will cost you more for each printed page.
Still, those are only half-measures, because consumables are only part of the cost of the traditional fax machine. It may seem like nitpicking because the amount is small, but you do pay for the electricity to run it, and every good businessman knows that small amounts add up over time. In addition, there is the somewhat greater cost of the phone line you need for the fax machine, as you certainly cannot share a phone line with a fax in a busy office. Then, too, there are parts that wear out and need replacing, service calls when your in-house tinkerer cannot fix something and other routine, ongoing expenses. It adds up.
Wait, there is more
If you think this is all nitpicking, by the way, add up a year's worth of all these costs and compare them to the $15-25 a month that a reputable online fax service will charge you. You will see a major difference, and that does not even include the least visible expenses, which involve employee time and a concept known as opportunity cost. When you have employees queuing around the fax machine waiting for incoming documents, you have employees that are not being as productive as you'd like. In addition, the simple fact that most office workers have to get up and go down the hall or into another cubicle to get an incoming fax also adds unnecessary time to a process that is supposed to be a time-saver. All of this costs you, the business owner, real money. Really.
Opportunity cost is hard to figure out sometimes, but it means the loss you sustain when you miss a good opportunity (for making sales, solving customer issues, developing new products, etc.) because your time is eaten up by unnecessary actions. Online faxing delivers documents right to a worker's e-mail inbox, and they send faxes the same way, from their own computer in their own office or area. No getting up and walking, no wasting two or three (or 10) minutes each time a fax has to be received or sent. Additionally, the time that is recaptured can be focused on more productive activities, so that you can keep those opportunity costs very low, even non-existent.
Bottom line
Online faxing is a tremendous bargain when you look at all the associated costs, although the savings on just paper and toner can be substantial. Lower costs, greater efficiency, better customer service and response time, and more effective use of time, money and resources are all real-world advantages of online faxing. Get yourself a trial offer for 30 days and find out yourself. Odds are, you will not go back to the machine-centric faxing system once you cross the bridge into online faxing.
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