Faxing Service

[Mick]

I've setup a fax using the Windows Fax Console.
No problems, all working fine.
What options do I have if during the day someone sends
me a fax and my pc is off. Is there a facility that holds my faxes,
like Outlook Express which stores/holds my emails till I return to the
office?
I don't know what to google for. Can you help?

Mick

 

[DL]

No options
A fax is simply a phone call, if you dont pick up it cannot be answered
Email is completely different, a msg is sent to your ISP server and held
there untill you start your mail app, whereby your mail app polls the server
for mail

 

[Mike Torello]

I've setup a fax using the Windows Fax Console.
No problems, all working fine.
What options do I have if during the day someone sends
me a fax and my pc is off. Is there a facility that holds my faxes,
like Outlook Express which stores/holds my emails till I return to the
office?

Outlook Express does NOT store or hold your email when the computer is
off. It merely does not COLLECT your email from where it IS stored
at, whether or not your computer is on or off.

I don't know what to google for. Can you help?

Your computer cannot receive a fax when it is off.

 

[Patrick Keenan]

I've setup a fax using the Windows Fax Console.
No problems, all working fine.
What options do I have if during the day someone sends
me a fax and my pc is off.

There is only one option.

If the PC is off, the call is not answered. You don't receive the fax.
If the caller tries later when your PC is on, you get another chance,
otherwise, that's it.

You might be able to set your PC's BIOS to wake on ring, but that can take
too long.

Is there a facility that holds my faxes,

Either your PC is on and the fax service answers the call, or it doesn't.
If it does, the fax images are saved.

No fax software, or machine, really works any differently.

like Outlook Express which stores/holds my emails till I return to the
office?

You misunderstand. That's not something that OE does.

OE only stores or "holds" mail it has *already downloaded from a server*.
If the PC is off, it doesn't have the mail, the server does. If you
disconnect from the network before you turn the machine on, you will not
receive the mail.

The fact that mail is held on a server is one of the reasons that email took
over from faxing.

HTH
-pk

HTH
-pk

 

[Mick]

Hello Mike,
Yes you're right, my mistake.
Actually, my email is stored in my inbox at my ISP which is downloaded to me
into OE when I boot up. I should have been more clear.

I also know that my computer can't receive faxes if it's turned off.
That was the whole point of my post.
I'm looking for a faxing service that receives my faxes and holds them
in some kind of inbox waiting for me to retrieve them.

Mick

 

[Elmo]

Hello Mike,
Yes you're right, my mistake.
Actually, my email is stored in my inbox at my ISP which is downloaded to me
into OE when I boot up. I should have been more clear.

I also know that my computer can't receive faxes if it's turned off.
That was the whole point of my post.
I'm looking for a faxing service that receives my faxes and holds them
in some kind of inbox waiting for me to retrieve them.

Mick

There are services that will receive the faxes for you, and you pick
them up in email.

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=email+fax+service&aq=0&oq=email+fax

 

[John John - MVP]

Hello Mike,
Yes you're right, my mistake.
Actually, my email is stored in my inbox at my ISP which is downloaded to me
into OE when I boot up. I should have been more clear.

I also know that my computer can't receive faxes if it's turned off.
That was the whole point of my post.
I'm looking for a faxing service that receives my faxes and holds them
in some kind of inbox waiting for me to retrieve them.

You will have to subscribe to a service for that kind of thing. Our
telco here offers a fax to email service for $10/month, all our incoming
faxes go to an email address and our outgoing faxes are done the usual
way, by way of our faxing program on our computers or by the old way of
feeding actual paper pages in the fax machine.

By the way, if your computer supports Wake on Ring your computer can
wake up to receive faxes, the only thing is that the computer may not
wake up fast enough to get the the fax on the first try, that isn't too
much of a problem as most fax machines or faxing programs try to re-send
failed faxes after a couple of minutes, by which time your computer
should be awake and able to accept the incoming fax.

John

 

[Mick]

Thanks All.

Mick

You will have to subscribe to a service for that kind of thing. Our telco
here offers a fax to email service for $10/month, all our incoming faxes
go to an email address and our outgoing faxes are done the usual way, by
way of our faxing program on our computers or by the old way of feeding
actual paper pages in the fax machine.

By the way, if your computer supports Wake on Ring your computer can wake
up to receive faxes, the only thing is that the computer may not wake up
fast enough to get the the fax on the first try, that isn't too much of a
problem as most fax machines or faxing programs try to re-send failed
faxes after a couple of minutes, by which time your computer should be
awake and able to accept the incoming fax.

John

 

[Bruce Chambers]

I've setup a fax using the Windows Fax Console.
No problems, all working fine.
What options do I have if during the day someone sends
me a fax and my pc is off.

You'll have no options. You computer obviously won't answer the call;
the sender will receive an error message from his fax machine to that
affect.

Is there a facility that holds my faxes,
like Outlook Express which stores/holds my emails till I return to the
office?

No. Faxes are sent directly from one fax machine to another; there is
not central server or holding area. Of course, more advanced fax
machines can be programmed to dial or even redial at specific times, but
the target fax machine must be on to received the fax.




--

Bruce Chambers

Help us help you:


http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx/kb/555375

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safety deserve neither liberty nor safety. ~Benjamin Franklin

Many people would rather die than think; in fact, most do. ~Bertrand Russell

The philosopher has never killed any priests, whereas the priest has
killed a great many philosophers.
~ Denis Diderot

 

[VanguardLH]

I've setup a fax using the Windows Fax Console.
No problems, all working fine.
What options do I have if during the day someone sends
me a fax and my pc is off. Is there a facility that holds my faxes,
like Outlook Express which stores/holds my emails till I return to the
office?
I don't know what to google for. Can you help?

Mick

You will have to specify a different phone number for received faxes
than you use for sending faxes. The receive phone number will have to
be for a 3rd party fax service that can receive faxes. Then whether
your computer is powered on or off, received faxes are sent to the 3rd
party service. The 3rd party service then sends you an e-mail with the
fax attached as a .tif or other filetype. You then receive your inbound
faxes using e-mail.

eFax provides a free receive-only account. Unfortunately they require
you install their software to read their attachment (their viewer knows
how to read the filetype for the fax attachment). The phone number they
give you for a free receive-only fax account will not be local. Senders
will be sending their faxes to whatever phone number eFax gives you
(which, for example, could be a number in Seattle, WA).

You can send your outbound faxes using:
- Your data/fax modem and fax software.
- 3rd party fax sending service (e.g., faxzero or k7, both free but k7
account expires after an idle usage expiration; there is also tpc.int
but I've never used them and they are staffed by volunteers).

You can receive your inbound faxes using:
- Your data/fax modem and fax software (if the computer is on).
- 3rd party fax receiving service (e.g., eFax, free for receive only,
non-local fax number).

When I had a POTS telephone line, I used my data/fax modem to send my
outbound faxes. I switched to a VOIP line and faxing is very unreliable
over it so I now use FaxZero. The disadvantage is that they add an
adware banner page to promote their service. You get to send 2 free
faxes per day up to 3 pages long. More than that requires paying them.
eFax probably has some max quota for how many faxes that I can receive
using their free account but I only get maybe half a dozen faxes
throughout the entire year (usually when having to deal with the
government, or some entity that thinks they are the government, like the
IRS). Usually I can refuse to do faxing and make them use e-mail.
Faxing went the way of dinosaurs. Anything you can fax you can e-mail.