Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) for business is continuing to gain popularity. The VoIP services market was valued at US $85.9 Bn in 2015, and is estimated to reach US $94.1 billion by the end of this year. We’re all aware that traditional faxing has become an inconvenient and outdated process, but is fax over Internet good for business?
The short answer is yes, and here are our top six reasons why:
1. Cost savings
Virtual fax is an affordable, efficient way to fax that embraces the convenience of modern technology. Virtual fax services typically cost between $5 and $50 monthly. However, a fax machine costs the company at least three times that much in addition to maintenance, replacement parts, and phone line costs.
Every year, approximately 17 billion to 100 billion faxes are sent around the world
2. Ease of use
With a virtual fax number, the user can send and receive faxes without a modem-based machine or dedicated phone line. Everything is done virtually over the web. This not only saves thousands of dollars in fax cartridges and paper, but also improves employee morale by eliminating the hours spent fighting with fax machine paper jams.
3. Flexibility
Since faxes are sent and received virtually, the business can handle multiple incoming faxes at the same time. Additionally, faxes are received in the office, whether staff are there or not. This offers employees greater flexibility with sending and receiving virtual faxes, as both can be done through the online dashboard and an easy-to-use web interface. Also, since you can locate a FoIP server nearly anywhere, this solution improves disaster recovery processes and fax reliability.
The average office worker spends 8 to 15 seconds per fax walking to the office fax machine
4. Quality
With virtual faxes, you are no longer reliant on a fixed-format, low-resolution analog fax machine. Faxes also come in crisp and clear every time. The fax communication is sent to the recipient’s email address with a PDF attachment that is easy to read, save, and forward.
5. Security
With the virtual fax number sending directly to the recipient’s email address, the risk of the wrong person reading the fax is reduced. Say goodbye to sensitive documents sitting unattended in the in-tray. Virtual fax services also employ OpenSSL or similar encryption systems to transmit and protect information.
6. Environmental friendliness
The traditional fax machine consumes 200 billion pages of paper in the U.S. alone. Switching just 5% of these machines to virtual fax numbers would save about 1 million trees each year, according to a 2015 study.
Faxing still remains a regular part of day to day business communication. Avoid busy signals, paper jams, misplaced faxes and other fax angst with a VoIP for business solution that includes a virtual fax number.
Sources:
BeBusinessed.com. (2015). Numbers Don’t Lie: Impressive Stats of Online Fax. http://bebusinessed.com/online-fax/impressive-stats-of-online-fax/
CIO Review. (2016, August 8). Benefits of Fax over IP for Business. http://www.cioreview.com/news/benefits-of-fax-over-ip-for-businesses-nid-18057-cid-97.html
Persistence Market Research. (2016, May). VoIP Services Market. http://www.persistencemarketresearch.com/market-research/voip-services-market.asp