Fax2Me Review

Fax2Me (www.Fax2Me.com) is a service of Hi-Tech Solutions, Inc., based in Chantilly, Virgina. The company has an interesting array of diverse communications products listed on their website. Fax2me is a stand-alone service, that is, it is not part of a unified messaging or communications package.

Modular Service Model

The basic service Fax2Me offers is Email to Fax. However, if you don’t require the ability to send faxes by email, you can choose any of their other services.

• Email to Fax – send faxes directly from your email software. Unlimited users.
• Fax to Email – get a fax number and receive faxes in your email inbox. Unlimited users.
• Fax on Demand – a service that allows you to store documents on Fax2Me.com’s servers for clients to access by touch-tone phone. This is potentially useful for customer support when the customer cannot access the Internet.
• Web Fax – add the ability to send a webpage as a fax, or send form information to a specified recipient from a web page. Fax2Me provides the buttons and scripts and the faxing services to make this easy.
• Fax Routing – incoming faxes are scanned and routed based on information found on the coversheet.

Each modular service has its own monthly fee. You only pay for what you need.

You are able to manage your account through Fax2Me’s account maintenance page.

Fees

Fax2Me.com uses the pay-as-you-go system of payment. The minimum you will pay is $1.00 per month for the most basic service, Email to Fax.

If you want to receive faxes (Fax to Email), you will pay either $2.00 per month for a toll-free number and 10 cents per page received, or $2.65 per month for a local number in the 703 or 571 area code and 2 cents per page received. There are no overage fees or other hidden fees for inbound faxes.

All outbound faxes cost you 10 cents per page. There are no overage fees because there are no plans.

Faxing to international destinations will cost you more. In order to find the rate you will pay per minute to an international destination, you use an online form that allows you to locate and input a country code. Pressing the submit button displays current fees for cities in that country.

Fax2Me requires a startup deposit of $10.00. You must provide a valid credit card number and authorized Fax2Me to automatically debit the card. You must maintain a balance of $1.00 or more to keep your account open and your services functioning.

Supported File Types for File Attachments

Using Fax2Me’s Email to Fax service is easy. Simply attach files to a normal email, address it properly, and your email and attachments are delivered to the fax recipient you selected. You will receive a notification when your fax has been successfully transmitted.

You can attach plain text files, HTML, .gif, .jpg and .bmp image files, Microsoft Word, Excel and Powerpoint files, .RTF files, .PDF, .PS, .EPS and .TIF. Fax2Me offers to help you out if you need to send document types not on their list.

Faxes you receive from Fax2Me will come as email attachments in either .PDF, .PS, .EPS or .TIF formats depending on which you choose when you set up your account. You are encouraged to contact Fax2Me if you need your faxes delivered to you in a different format.

Microsoft Office Integration

Fax2Me’s online fax servers are configured to interface directly with the fax services built into the Microsoft Office suite 2003 and newer. In Office you choose the “Send” option from the main menu, and the select “Internet Fax”. Follow the prompts to complete your destination and basic information and your fax will be on its way.

The Office integration feature works in 32-bit versions of Office 2003 and 2007, and in both 32-bit and 64-bit version of Office 2010.

Impression

Fax2Me.com strikes this reviewer as a small company. This is not necessarily bad. There are many small companies that provide quality services to their communities. In the Internet age, the community has become anyone with an Internet connection.

Fax2Me.com offers a solid Privacy Statement, a clear Terms & Conditions document and verifiable contact information. These basic items of information add credibility to their site, and allow you to feel more confident about contacting them about their services.

The quality of Fax2Me and its parent company’s websites imply some technical and programming expertise. There are gaps in the information those sites provide, such as uptime guarantees, server locations, physical security and system backup or redundancy strategies. You should consider investigating your concerns about such things by personally discussing them with the people at Fax2Me before signing up for their services.