Traditional faxing was manual and involved a lot of paperwork and scanning documents repeatedly using stand-alone fax machines. And this is what most people who don’t know about fax automation think faxing is still about.
But for tech-savvy companies that consistently fax sensitive and confidential documents, fax automation technology is heaven-sent. To them, automatic faxing is a catalyst for streamlining fax workflows and ultimately enhancing operational efficiencies. Automatic faxing makes sending fax documents seamless, convenient, effortless, and a delightful experience altogether.
Here’s what automated fax entails, its benefits, types, and how to put fax automation software to work.
What Is Fax Automation?
In essence, fax automation involves cloud-based faxing where all faxing processes start and complete in the cloud (online). With automatic faxing, you don’t need in-office fax servers and fax machines to fax documents. You only need to leverage a web-based fax service like MetroFax and fax online through your mobile, tablet, or computer.
Using cloud-based fax automation solutions, you can receive inbound faxes in your email inbox and send outbound faxes from your computer or mobile device. As long as you have reliable internet, you can utilize fax automation software and enjoy convenient cloud-based faxing through your email address from wherever you are.
Benefits of Fax Automation
Fax automation has multifold benefits, particularly for modern companies that rely heavily on technology to get things done. Companies that reap the most benefits from automated fax solutions usually have business process automation systems already running their operations.
However, you can benefit immensely from fax automation even if you haven’t embraced process automation yet. These are the perks of automatic faxing:
Reduces Manual Processes and Faxing Errors
Human errors like faxing documents to an incorrect fax number can cause untold losses. For instance, in 2018, OhioHealth’s Grant Medical Center suffered reputation damage after faxing sensitive medical information to the wrong recipients due to a transposed fax number.
Automatic faxing helps you avoid such errors by minimizing the manual processes involved. For instance, instead of manually inputting a recipient fax number into a fax machine, fax automation software allows you to save and retrieve fax numbers when faxing. This reduces your chances of using an incorrect fax number, particularly when faxing bulk documents in a hurry.
Lowers Labor and Equipment Costs
With automatic faxing, you don’t need to purchase fax machines, toner, paper, and fax server hardware. You also don’t need dedicated IT staff running your in-office faxing system. This translates to substantial upfront and recurrent cost savings. You’ll only need to orient your staff on utilizing automated fax efficiently and pay for an online faxing plan that suits your business best.
Helps You Easily Scale Your Faxing Capacity
As your business grows, your faxing needs increase in tandem. With traditional faxing, scaling your fax capacity would mean purchasing more hardware and upgrading your fax servers to process more outbound and incoming faxes. It would be too resource and time intensive.
However, cloud-based automated faxing scales as your fax needs increase. You can easily add more users, fax lines, and fax documents in bulk without additional hardware investment. With fax automation, upgrading your fax capacity is as easy as upgrading your fax service plan.
Enhances Document Management Integrity
Fax automation helps you readily satisfy regulatory compliance standards in your industry. With fax automation software, you can leverage the tools to monitor and archive your essential faxes. This way, you can have all the documents in one place when there’s an audit of fax communications and you must reference past faxes.
Improves Information Confidentiality
It’s challenging for cyber criminals to intercept information faxed through an internet fax provider. Online fax providers like MetroFax go the extra distance to facilitate end-to-end data encryption on their platforms. Hence, when you leverage fax automation, you can rest assured your fax documents will reach the intended recipient intact.
Different Types of Fax Automation Solutions
Fax automation solutions run on the cloud. Across the board, there are three tiers of fax solutions:
- Free cloud fax service: This basic fax automation package targets individuals. It focuses on users who fax occasionally using their mobile devices or computers.
- Cloud fax: This solution is more popular among small business owners, freelancers, consultants, and other solo professionals. You pay a monthly fee for a set number of faxes.
- Enterprise cloud fax: The enterprise plan is the most advanced fax solution targeting large companies. It emphasizes data security and integration with existing enterprise software.
How To Implement a Fax Automation Tool
If you’re ready to implement fax automation in your business, here are three quick tips for settling on the right fax automation software:
Identify Your Needs and Objectives
Review your company’s current faxing needs and consider whether and how they’ll change. Compare your current faxing needs with the fax features offered by your provider. For instance, if you frequently send faxes to multiple recipients, you’ll want a fax provider who allows you to send many attachments in different image formats.
Choose the Right Solution for Your Business
Online fax providers usually have multi-leveled fax solutions to satisfy companies’ varying fax needs. For instance, MetroFax offers three fax plans:
- Essential
- Best Value
- Professional
The Essential plan offers fewer fax solutions than Best Value and Professional but can be more business viable for some companies. Compare each plan’s offerings and judge if it complements your company’s fax needs.
Set Up and Install the Solution
Put your selected fax plan to work by setting it up on your mobile device or computer. But before committing to a long-term fax plan, ascertain whether it’s the best of the bunch. Most fax providers will allow you to switch plans as you test which one is the best fit.
Boost Your Efficiency and Productivity With Fax Automation
Fax automation technology has prompted more legal, finance, and healthcare companies to return to faxing. Business owners have realized automatic faxing is quick, cost-effective, and convenient, similar to sending emails.
In our day and age, where business process automation is on the uptick, embracing fax automation is both a need and a necessity for modern companies. Fortunately, MetroFax is here for you. Using MetroFax, you can fax online with your computer, phone, or tablet from anywhere.
Visit MetroFax to learn more about our solution and start enjoying our faxing magic.
