Is Cloud-Based Faxing Right for You?

A half-century after the first commercial fax machine was introduced in 1964, faxing is at an important crossroads. Most companies have years of legacy fax in place, woven deeply into their business processes. Fax servers had been the solution of choice for medium and large organizations, due to their greater efficiency and integration capability than standalone fax machines. Fax servers changed the accepted model of one fax server/one phone line.

Yet as these servers reach the end of life, IT managers are looking to outsource faxing to the cloud – as has been accomplished successfully for other applications such as customer relationship management, human capital management and marketing automation. Even the most critical systems such as email and intranets are now candidates for outsourcing.

The number of organizations opting to switch their in-house fax server to a hosted fax solution is on the rise. Companies are realizing that the ongoing costs associated with fax servers are too high. Reliability headaches like lost faxes, busy signals and unplanned server downtime are also factors. Capacity issues requiring considerable attention be paid to managing fax volume and provisioning need to be weighed as well. And the fact that fax servers require dedicated IT time that takes away from other mission-critical systems drives firms to explore cloud fax solutions.

The good news is that cloud technologies enable IT managers to move to more efficient and less cumbersome document transmission solutions. Cloud-based systems give them the potential to economize in a number of key areas, a development that IT managers welcome unequivocally.

However, whether an organization’s IT manager is a sole-proprietor or a CIO overseeing the IT infrastructure of a multi-location corporation, due diligence is essential to ensure IT systems are managed in a way that increases efficiency while improving user productivity.

What is Cloud Computing?

In the broadest terms, cloud computing involves using offsite servers to store and share data. More specifically, it enables IT managers to dedicate less of their budgets to purchasing and maintaining their own in-house servers, other hardware, and software programs. Cloud-hosted applications (also known as software service, or https://apps.apple.com/us/app/fax-from-iphone-fax-app/id1563922708) carry no upfront installation or equipment charges, no ongoing maintenance costs, and let users access key business tools and information through common user interfaces – Web browsers, smart phones, etc. – making them convenient and easy to use. Of course, moving to a cloud-based service often requires companies to examine their biases and modes of historical thinking; habits long embedded in a company’s way of doing business are sometimes difficult to change.

The fax machine, for example, is among the most widely used pieces of office equipment in any industry. Despite the ubiquity of email, many businesses still use fax every day, and inertia makes it difficult for them to rethink this method of communication. Yet faxing offers perhaps the most readily available cost savings and improved efficiency of any office activity today.

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