How to Receive Faxes on Your Computer
If you own a regular fax machine, you know how much paper and space it takes up in your home or office. The EPA estimates that an office worker uses about 10,000 sheets of paper each year. You may be able to save some trees and money as well as set up a more efficient office space by choosing to receive faxes on your computer instead. There are a number of convenient online fax services that allow you to both receive and send faxes right from your computer desktop.
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Things You'll Need
- Online fax service provider
- Adobe Reader (to load PDFs) or image editing program (to load JPEGs)
Instructions
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1
Choose an online fax service. Popular services include Ringcentral.com and ExtremeFax.com.
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2
Create a new account and pay for the first month of the service (some allow you to start with a free trial). The service will allow you to choose a new fax number and assign it to your account instantly.
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3
Click the link to download the fax service software to your computer. Load the online fax software on your system.
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4
Log in with the account information that you created in Step 2. Under "Account Preferences" or similar, click the option to sign on automatically. This will allow the fax software to load with your account information (including your assigned fax number) each time you start up your computer.
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5
Send your online fax number to all of your contacts. Be sure to add it to your business cards if you run an office. When you receive a fax, a "New Fax Message" or similar icon will appear in your system tray or fax software dashboard.
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Double-click the "New Fax Message" icon. Your fax message will load as a PDF file inside of Adobe Reader (or Acrobat if you have it). Some services will open the file as a JPEG or TIF image file in your computer's default image editing program. Print or save the received message to your computer.
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Tips & Warnings
Some online fax services will also email a copy of the received fax to you. This way you will know that a fax is waiting even if you are not at the computer where you installed the software.
