The title pretty much says it all, and frankly, how is this possible in 2007 is beyond me.
But wait, isn’t it 2009 (almost 2010?). Yes it is. An therein lies the rub. I wrote this two years ago, and the fact that most of it is still valid is quite sad. Fax technology should be dead – it’s ridiculously unpractical to translate meaningful text to dumb image, when on the receiving end they need meaningful text again. Yet in many professions faxes are still used, and from time to time all of us are forced to dealing with it. That means finding a service appropriate for the ad-hoc, just-in-case use, nothing less, nothing more.
I’ve had a trusted old eFax numer for perhaps a decade, never gave it a lot of thought. However, some glitches prompted me to check again. Here’s an updated version of the matrix I published in 2007 – the comparison of 10 Internet fax services by Top Ten Reviews:
What’s wrong here? There’s not a single offer tailored for individual ad-hoc users. I’m sure a busy office has enough fax traffic to justify the $10 or so that most of these services charge, but as a consumer, the grand total of faxes I receive in a year is perhaps 2-3, and I don’t send more than 5 per year. $10 is not a huge amount, but why would I pay a monthly subscription optimized for 1-200 pages monthly traffic?
The free version of eFax (btw, how could the granddaddy of Internet fax services escape the comparison?) allows free inbound services, but no sending at all. I don’t expect free sending, but why can’t I pay per use, only for the pages I send? Oh, well, since the previous (2007) vintage of this post, I’ve found two free / pay-per-fax services that solve the outbound problem: FaxZero and GotFreeFax. Very well – problem solved. Except now there’s trouble on the inbound front.
In the past two years two of my eFax numbers “disappeared”, and so did an alternative one @ FaxDigits (in fact FaxDigits no longer seems to exist). For now, any time I need to give my fax number to someone, I need to send a test fax to it first to check if it’s still operational. That’s crap. Yes, I get what I pay for, you might say – which is zero. But like I said, I’m willing to pay, just not $10 per month – that would make the 2-3 faxes I receive par year really expensive. I can’t believe I am the only one with such usage pattern and there is no reliable provider with a usage-based pricing plan to match such usage.
I understand it may not be economically feasible for a service provider to maintain all these phone numbers and charge pennies – so perhaps the solution is lump it with another service that already runs millions of phone numbers – Google Voice? Let’s hope they will step up. 🙂
Finally, here’s Dilbert’s take on the issue. 
Wow – yeah FAX – I hardly remember. Wasn’t that the stuff that replaced Telex? I haven’t touched a fax machine since exactly 3 years – the last time it was December 2006. Our old Fax is actually in a box the server room. It was kind of odd in the first year but today – we just don’t miss it at all. Scanner & email that’s it. Even the IRS is cool with it these days 😉 So come on, let go. If somebody says “It has to be a FAX” just tell ’em I don’t have a FAX. I know it is hard when it is a customer but if they ask send me a Telex?
Cheers
Axel
http://xeesm.com/AxelS
Zoli, I’m quite happy with Pamfax. It has the kind of transactional pricing that makes it a good fit for personal use. –Sam
In France we have it
http://www.ovh.com/fr/sms_et_fax/ecofax_perso.xml
Fax number is free with a .com or .fr domain
You can send 10 fax free/day
You can also have a voip SIP “land line” for 1 Euro/month, outbound call are unlimited.
OVH is the first hosting company in France (and I don’t work for it). OVH First objective is good technology for good price, not money.
Just to note one slight inaccuracy – MaxEmail actually does have a plan that’s $24/year, but you’ll have a fax number in the 815 area code which is northern Illinois away from Chicago.
The main drawback is that that account doesn’t include caller ID, for which they’ll ding you another $24/year.
Correction, MaxEmail is $24/qtr, $85/yr
@Axel: I haven’t tried using a fax machine also. 😀
That’s why it’s really good to know that there’s still fax message sending/receiving over the internet which I believe it’s faster and safer. I can always rely on it since I’ve started using it.
wwww.greenfax.com – pay per use for transmit only accounts. 7c for 1st page, 5 for each subsequent page. Have been using them and am happy with them so far. Customer support is based in PA and seems to know what they are talking about.
I combine this with a free eFax receive only account.
Who says there’s none? I believe there are still few who remain quality service for their customers.
Never thought that the internet world allow sending fax document as easy as sending an email. That’s really amazing to think, right?
In the future you will only able to see faxes on museums.
The last time I needed to fax from home, as the fax button on my PSC2210 no longer works, was 2009 and I used Pay Per Fax. Today I need to fax and Pay Per Fax is down until Monday ;( However, it is better than the others I checked out. I don’t need to receive faxes. I send faxes very seldom and don’t need a monthly or yearly plan. I can pay with PayPal at Pay Per Fax. In ’09 I paid $1.15 for the fax I sent.
Pay Per Fax also accepts .tiff, so I can send a scanned document!!