[JiRaffe]

Even more questions. I am the king of questions

I've been informed that if i want to appear as a professional business i should invest in a fax machine. is this true? if so how much does it cost to set it up? do you have to set up a separate line rental for it? it seems like a bit of a pain in the arse to me

anybody use fax to email stuff? i saw this http://www.blackboxtelecom.co.uk/faxtoemail.php but i don't really want to pay that much when i will rarely use it

[oli]

theres fax built into windows I think, personally I wouldnt worry too much about it, things move on fax will be a thing of the past.

[JiRaffe]

glad you said that cos I've never used a fax machine in my life.

windows? what's that?

[tomson]

used to have a fax years ago - well the missus did, she used it for work (she's a journalist) - was a phone & fax jobby, just plugs into your usual phone line and it detects if a fax is being sent. You can pick em up for next to nowt on ebay.

[Mr Fred]

I would never be without a fax but i suppose it depends on the industry you work in.

[JiRaffe]

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.d...tegory=50 202

there's phones like this on ebay but a fax number is separate from a phone number so i assume you would therefore need to pay for two separate line rentals. is this right? maybe i should just get someone to recieve faxes for me then pick them up. probably much cheaper

[oli]

Id use a fax to email service, I seem to remember a free one ill try and find for ya.

[oli]

http://fax.co.uk/fax2email/fax2email.htm £20 a years not too bad

[JiRaffe]

cheers oli, i'll send you a pint by fax

[oli]

have to email it m8

[tomson]

Originally Posted by JiRaffe

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.d...tegory=50 202

there's phones like this on ebay but a fax number is separate from a phone number so i assume you would therefore need to pay for two separate line rentals. is this right? maybe i should just get someone to recieve faxes for me then pick them up. probably much cheaper

a fax number is only different from a phone number if you set it up that way. If you have a dedicated line for your fax then yep you will have a different number, but you can have the same number recieve voice calls and faxes. Your fax/phone machine can intercept the incoming call and react approptiately.

For 20quid a year tho that fax2email is probably your best bet.

[andrewparker]

Originally Posted by JiRaffe

windows? what's that?

Do you need a fax machine to have a fax number? If you can find out how to get a fax number this is how to do it in OS X -

Open System Preferences and click Print & Fax.
Click Faxing.
Select the "Receive faxes on this computer" checkbox.
Type your fax number in the My Fax Number field. This is used to identify your computer when you send or receive a fax.
Choose the number of rings before your computer answers a fax.
If you want your incoming faxes automatically saved to a specific folder, select the "Save to" checkbox and choose a folder from the pop-up menu.
If you want your incoming faxes automatically forwarded via email, select the "Email to" checkbox and type an email address in the "Email to" field. You can also choose addresses directly from Address Book by clicking the Address Book button to the right of the "Email to" field.
If you want your incoming faxes automatically printed, select the "Print on printer" checkbox and choose a printer from the pop-up menu.

Sounds alreet!

[JiRaffe]

that sounds great and none-too-difficult to set up in osX with the only exception being the fact that I do not have a fax number. according to tomson, a fax number can just be your phone number but as my comp is on broadband i'm not sure how that would work. i think i may just be lazy and go for the fax-to-email thing.

oli, don't be silly, you can't send pints by email

[Bill Posters]

Originally Posted by andrewparker

Do you need a fax machine to have a fax number? If you can find out how to get a fax number this is how to do it in OS X -

...10.3+

I hear good things about the fax facilities in Panther.
I'm never too quick off the blocks with OS upgrades though.

[Brown]

ask your mobile supplier if they offer a fax service. orange will give you a free fax number and then text you when you get a fax. you then phone your answerphone and direct the fax to a fax machine when you pass one. i think isent 2 faxes last year, and that was because they didn't have email.

[ncrossland]

I get my broadband from plus.net - you get free fax2email as part of the package

[Bill Posters]

Been helping a friend search/setup a basic hosting deal.
Ended up shoehorning her into Supanames Mid Host.

With that £40 p/a deal she gets the following phone/fax services thrown in.
http://www.supanames.co.uk/supatelecoms.htm

I haven't looked through it all completely yet, but at first glance it actually seems like a great/handy suite of call/fax services.

Does anyone have any experience with those Supanames services?
I'm considering signing up for them myself and the extra tel/fax numbers and call and fax routing would be v handy right now.

If anyone has the time, I'd appreciate it if you could take a peak at the list of services (above link) and let me know if the service seems worth going for.
(I don't favour the idea of leaving my mac on and connected when I'm out to receive any fax calls that may come through, which is why a 'fielding/routing service' such as this might prove useful.)

TIA

[ncrossland]

Those 070 numbers are quite expensive to call, quite a bit more than national rate, I think. The telecoms company gets a cut, hence why it is free to you.

[tomson]

Seems a pretty neat idea though. I like the way you can choose your number... but then i'm easily pleased. I've heard a few good things about supanames - both about their prices and quality of service.

I might go for 207 060 0000 - only its £10,000. Ay carumba!

[Bill Posters]

Ahaa…
(Thx ncrossland)

How much will callers pay?
Unified Messaging numbers are not premium rate numbers. Calls to 07050 numbers from a BT landline are charged at the BT 'K' rate - which is 12.5, 25, 37.5 incl VAT (weekends, night, day) pence per minute before discount. Calls from other types of phones are approximately the same as calling a mobile phone. Please note: the cost of calling 07050 numbers is very shortly falling to 10.5, 22, 32p/min

Not totally out of the question, but more investigation needed, I think.