E-Fax Comparison 

The internet fax service industry is old, established, and very competitive. So, why is e-fax raising prices to their customers? Well, it's because they can. For one, they are the industry leader. However, another reason is that they have found a way to lock in their customers. Once someone opens an account and chooses a fax number, e-fax will never let them transfer that number away. Here's their standard response to anyone trying to move to a new, low cost fax provider:

"J2 Global rejects the LOA to port the fax number. j2 Global® is the customer of record for this number, and as such, we are rejecting the request to port this number out. We sell bundled services on our DIDs, and do not grant our users the right to port out the number we assign to them"

In the telecom industry, porting a number is a standard process. You can change your cell phone carrier and keep your number. It's the same in the fax industry, except for e-fax.

Here's a comparison of internet fax services. 

 

Senior Citizens Doing E-Commerce

If you see a group of seniors hanging out at a beach bar don't assume they are talking about knitting and their grandchildren. This group runs an online internet fax service from their home offices.

They know a lot about faxing as that was the crazy new technology in the 1980's that they worked with. Now, all these years later, they use that expertise to run FAXtopia. They are living the digital nomad life that some 'youngsters' dream of. 

Fax Technology Is Not Changing

The basic technology is not changing. It's still a tone that gets delivered, but now to a fax server instead of a fax machine. I would have thought that the resolution would have improved over the years but it's remained a low resolution service. 

However, there is one thing that the old fax machines excel in; document security. Faxing from one machine to another machine is almost totally secure. It goes through the phone lines and nothing is left on a computer, server or e-mail account. The document is on paper with no electronic trail. Here's an interesting article that answers the question; Are faxes secure?