Fax remains an essential service for most organizations today; for many it is still the preferred method of transmission for various legal documents, contracts, and invoices. But where fax no longer meets a corporate standard for outbound communications, enterprises will invariably still deal with organizations that do rely on the service. Fortunately, moving to a converged IP network environment affords enterprises an attractive opportunity to optimize and streamline legacy fax operations.

The Advantage of a Centralized Fax Service

As discussed in the Info-Tech Advisor research note, “Cut Operational Cost with PC-Based Faxing,” the costs involved with managing and operating traditional fax machines can be considerable. Beyond the costs of consumables, equipment maintenance, phone lines and toll charges, standalone fax machines are also segregated from the rest of the IT infrastructure and not actively managed or monitored. In addition to being inefficient and expensive, from a document and information management perspective this is simply inadequate for many organizations today.