| Like so many things in the business world, the way | | | | can get your faxes as email attachments. You can |
| people send faxes has changed over time. Fax | | | | also view these on your mobile phone or PDA, which |
| technology has been around in different forms for | | | | can be a lot more convenient for many people. |
| decades now, but, like other ways of spreading | | | | But how does internet fax work? Usually, you can sign |
| information, it is changing and evolving. People used to | | | | up for a service for a low monthly fee, then use their |
| have to buy an analog fax machine, feed copies of | | | | website or software to upload a document that you |
| their documents into the machine, and then send them | | | | want to send as a fax. These usually support many |
| to a fax number. This was a time consuming process, | | | | different types of documents, but they usually send |
| and it often resulted in faxes that were hard to read | | | | the file as a TIFF or PDF file. Sometimes they have |
| because of their poor image quality. Worse still, many | | | | their own proprietary file formats. Faxed documents |
| faxes never made it through or were hard to read | | | | are usually sent as email attachments, but you can |
| when they reached the recipient. These types of fax | | | | also send files to regular fax lines. This can offer you a |
| machines were expensive to use and maintain. They | | | | lot of flexibility. |
| used up a lot of paper, and much of it was on faxes | | | | You can send and receive faxes on your computer, |
| that weren't wanted. The paper in the machines would | | | | but you can also still send regular fax documents to |
| jam up, resulting in many printing errors. The machines | | | | businesses and individuals who use fax machines. |
| would run out of ink. Companies had to pay extra | | | | They can send you documents from their fax |
| money for dedicated phone lines for their fax machine, | | | | machines as well, but you never have to buy an |
| and they had to pay long distance charges on top of | | | | expensive fax machine or pay the other fees |
| that. | | | | associated with owning a fax machine. Sending a fax |
| Sending faxes is now cheaper and easier than it has | | | | from your computer is a lot like sending an email. The |
| ever been. Now that it is possible to use your | | | | process may be slightly different depending on which |
| computer to send a fax, you can send a fax from | | | | internet fax provider you choose, but it is usually very |
| anywhere that an internet connection is available, and | | | | easy and much faster than using a fax machine. They |
| you don't have to buy any special equipment in order | | | | may provide you with a number where you can also |
| to send and receive faxes. You don't have to wait at | | | | receive faxes. The faxes you receive are converted |
| the office fax machine for a fax to come in; now you | | | | to PDF files and then sent to your email address. |
