Get a Free Inbound Fax Number - Comments Page 1

I have been using K7 for a long time. I saves on having the fax machine turned on. No more paying for fax paper or ink or an extra phone line. I get all of my faxs in my e-mail box. Unlimited incoming faxs for free. Unable to find a free unlimited outgoing service so I just turn on my fax machine only when I have to fax out. K7 is just GREAT !

Here's a little known secret about eFAX: Their FAX attachment file has a ".efx" extension. Because of that, they require that you download and install their Messenger software to open and read the attachment. All they've done is change the ".tif" extension to ".efx". So You don't need to install their Messenger software. Just change the extension name back to ".tif" and open the file with any software that opens a ".tif" file. An example would be Irfanview, which opens TIF files as well of many, many other types of files.

I use Windows software to send & receive faxes. You do have to have a land line in order to be able to pull it off. Been doing this for at least 10 yrs.

Great article! Keep up the good work, Bob!

I went to the efax homepage. The only option for free is a 30 day free trial.

EDITOR'S NOTE: Why did you go there? The link I gave for the FREE offer is correct.

Only in the U.S.A.? or e.g. New Zealand?

What is the difference between eFax Free® and eFax Plus®? With eFax Plus, you are provided with:

•a local or toll-free number.
•the ability to send and receive faxes.
•lifetime fax storage in eFax Message Center for life of account.

eFax Free is a limited account. When you sign up for eFax Free, you are provided with:

•a non-local number to which you may receive faxes.
•30 days fax storage in eFax Message Center.
•You cannot send faxes with eFax Free.

EDITOR'S NOTE: I'm assuming your question was rhetorical, since you answered it yourself. :-)

Another great topic, Mr. Bob Rankin.
But I also have a few rhetorical questions myself.
For example:
1) Why do we really need a "Fax" service in the 21st Century?
2) What is exactly the use/need for a fax (HW or SW) that cannot be achieved via the digital file types of a PDF or a TIFF/JPEG/PNG, or etc.?
3) Why can't an OCR be used to convert an image file containing text, w/o the need for a "fax machine"?

In the case of Vonage VoIP, their website provides the following information for those who insist on maintaining a hardware fax machine: "NOTE: Your Vonage voice line is not optimized for fax service, however, you can send and receive an occasional fax on this line. To do so, you must unplug the telephone cord used for voice services from the port on the Vonage adapter and plug the cord from your fax machine into that same port."

Thanks Bob. Very nice article. I was looking for a free inbound fax number and this article helped me.

~ Hira

@ Maury - eFax is in few countries

Ultra cool. Thanks man!

Thanks Bob. Great article. I went with Fax Away and found they do also provide .PDF format for inbound faxes. That is great for me. Should save me $16 per month over current Efax service (but without a local number). Happy New Year!

Thanks a lot for sharing info.
Keep it up
regards manish

Hi guys,
Just to add another thing in the list, guys who are looking for a fax to email solution and want there fax number to be a non US and a normal landline or fax number rather than those premium rate numbers should check out www.advancefone.com .
Advancefone provides virtual fax numbers something around in 40 countries , you can receive phone calls and faxes on same number. pretty good calling rates for outbound phone calls as well.
here is link:
www.advancefone.com

Hello Bob, Thanks for the informative article. I'm stuck at "It also took a lot of bouncing back and forth between the Vovox website and the Vovox client app to discover that I needed to configure the fax-to-email option before incoming faxes would be forwarded to my email inbox." Do you have any suggestions on how to do the last step in this process? Thanks so much. Marshall

I can also recommend you online fax from Popfax: http://www.popfax.com, it is very easy to use, fast, reliable and they offer a free trial period for testing their service.

EDITOR'S NOTE: See my comments about PopFax here: http://askbobrankin.com/free_internet_faxing_services.html

Thank you for helping us with finding the right company.

Nice article but you are leaving out a biggie on Faxaway...
1 dollar a month yes, but you can be charged for sending faxes to long distance numbers outside of the continental United States. The first on the list is Afghanistan at $2.22 a minute.
As Faxaway states: "Minimum charge per transmission is 60 seconds with billing done in 6-second increments thereafter, except Mexico which is billed in full minute increments."
Not likely for most perhaps, but it's possible to incur huge charges!
Personally, I would never leave my credit card open to possible unlimited charges and headaches.

Hi - This is great information - maybe you can solve this situation - I used FREE EFAX - INCOMING for several years and it was great - I don't receive a lot of faxes - never went over the limited number. Recently - the past few weeks, I had to have some faxes sent to me and they never came thru. I contacted EFAX on their website at the "CONTACT US" link. I receive an email asking for specific information,which I have replied to twice and have yet to receive a response as to what the problem is. I called their t0ll free number - was connected to India - the person I spoke to said he did not see my repy in the system, I then sent it again, still now response. I need to have a fax # do I just go back to their website and sign on again at the bottom of the page as you mention or is there another TOTALLY FREE FAX SERVICE FOR INCOMING FAXES ONLY?

EDITOR'S NOTE: There are a couple of other options in the article where you posted this comment.

Tell us about CamScanner or other similar services?

In response to RandiO's comment on 14 Nov 2013:

In my experience, some companies do not have the ability to receive e-mails with attachments. Many of these some companies do not have the ability to have attachments securely transmitted to them via an SSL encrypted website.

In my opinion, if more companies would become PDF friendly and allow password protected PDF's to be e-mailed, or uploaded via an SSL encrypted website, I believe the fax business would die altogether.

So, until companies fully and completely embrace the newer technologies, these legacy technologies will continue to be required in the business world.