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Frequently Asked Questions

What is PLUSFAX™ ?
How does PLUSFAX™ work?
Why should I use PLUSFAX™ ?
Isn't PLUSFAX™ just like efax and all the others?
What is Inbound Fax Routing?
What is Outbound Fax Routing?
Do I need a special Fax Machine or some special gizmo?
How does PLUSFAX™ deliver paper documents to Instant Messengers?
How does PLUSFAX™ reduce my long distance fax bill?
How can I FAX WITHOUT THE PHONE BILL™?
How does the recipient benefit from PLUSFAX?
What do I need to send a PLUSFAX™?
Do I need an email address to use PLUSFAX™ ?
Do I need an Internet Connection to send a PLUSFAX™ ?
What kind of printer should I use ?
Can I use a PLUSFAX™ Cover Page™ more than once ?
Must my PC be attached to the fax machine in some way ?
How do I know if the recipient received my PLUSFAX™ ?
What about privacy ?
Is there a maximum number of recipients ?
Can I use PLUSFAX™ to send a fax to an Internet Fax Machine ?
What are the most frequent sources of problems ?
What is a 'Valid PLUSFAX™ Document' ?
How much does PLUSFAX™ cost ?
What is a 'Fax Machine Station ID' ?
Is there a maximum message size ?
What is an 'Un-listed Server' ?
Can you trace an email message that did not arrive?
Can PLUSFAX™ be used to broadcast regular faxes ?
Can PLUSFAX™ deliver e-mail messages and paper documents securely over the Internet ?
How can PLUSFAX™™ save millions of trees.?
How does PLUSFAX™ simplify fax broadcasting?
Can I use my existing MS Outlook or Outlook Express Address Book to prepare a PLUSFAX™ Cover Page?
How can PLUSFAX™ deliver faster than a regular fax?
How does PLUSFAX™ save photocopying and scanning costs?
How can PLUSFAX™ reduce the number of my phone lines?
Why not just use my VOIP setup for faxing?

PLUSFAX™ is a patent-pending combination of a technology and a Web Service.

It's the ONLY WAY of transmitting a PAPER DOCUMENT from ANY regular unmodified FAX MACHINE to ANY EMAIL ADDRESS without having the recipient set up a special fax number.

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How does PLUSFAX™ work?

PLUSFAX™ is just like sending a regular fax.
- Print a Cover Page
- Load the fax machine
- Dial a number and press 'Send'

The minimal differences with a regular fax are that the you must print a PLUSFAX™ Cover Page and dial a PLUSFAX™ Router.
Your fax will be passed to the PLUSFAX™ service which delivers to your recipient a digital image representing your paper document.

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Why should I use PLUSFAX™ ?

There are at least 20 reasons for using PLUSFAX™.

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Isn't PLUSFAX™ just like efax and all the others?

NO!

PLUSFAX™ doesn't require a special fax number to be set up by the recipients. In fact, to send a PLUSFAX™ all you need to do is go here, fill in a couple of email addresses, print a cover page and send your PLUSFAX™

PLUSFAX™ allows you to -
SEND A PAPER DOCUMENT
from -
ANY REGULAR UNMODIFIED FAX MACHINE DIRECT
to -
ANY MIX of address types including ANY EMAIL ADDRESS, SOME TYPES OF INSTANT MESSENGER 'BUDDY' and ANY REGULAR FAX NUMBER.

With PLUSFAX™ you can also do things like:
- fax to a mix of email addresses, Instant Messenger Buddies and Regular Fax Numbers with just one transmission from the fax machine
- load a copy of your fax directly into your document imaging system without re-scanning
- beat the fax machine snoopers
- transmit faxes over the Internet with TOTAL PRIVACY
- do all that WITHOUT GETTING A PHONE BILL.

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What is Inbound Fax Routing?

Inbound Fax Routing is a choice made by the RECIPIENT .

Inbound Fax Routing services such as eFax, jFax etc require fax RECIPIENTS to set up a SPECIAL FAX NUMBER to RECEIVE faxes in their email inboxes. This requires one NEW fax number for each email address. It also requires the recipient to change his or her existing fax number and advise the world of the change. To equip every email address with its own fax number would require around a billion new telephone lines worldwide, a practical impossibility!

Inound Fax Routing provides the recipient with some additional convenience BUT the sender has a very serious and unrecognised disadvantage. Most fax senders assume the contents will remain private. Inbound Fax Routing services re-direct the document over the public Internet without the sender's knowledge, thereby creating a VERY SERIOUS SECURITY RISK which the vast majority of senders do not recognize.

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What is Outbound Fax Routing?

Outbound Fax Routing is a choice made by the SENDER .

Outbound Fax Routing using PLUSFAX™ is just like sending a regular fax except that IN ADDITION to any of the world's 100,000,000+ fax numbers THE SENDER can FAX DIRECT to ANY of the world's billion+ email addresses.

No new fax number is required, neither is any special setup of any kind, just access to a PC with a printer and access to a working fax machine, which need not be anywhere near each other.

In fact, why not TRY IT NOW

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Do I need a special Fax Machine or some special 'Black Box'?

NO.

All you need is a regular, working, unmodified fax machine.

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How does PLUSFAX™ deliver paper documents to Instant Messengers?

PLUSFAX™ converts your paper document to a Fax Image File which it places on a secure web site. It then sends the recipient an Instant Message providing a means of viewing the fax with his or her Web Browser.

As with all regular Instant Messengers the recipient must be present, and must NOT be behind a firewall that blocks messages from a possibly unknown source.

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How does PLUSFAX™ reduce my long distance fax bill?

PLUSFAX™ permits you to transmit paper documents from any fax machine to any email address and to Instant Messenger clients. Your fax machine can transmit the document to a local PLUSFAX Router™ from where it is delivered over the Internet, thereby avoiding long distance telephone charges.
If you would like to FAX WITHOUT THE PHONE BILL™ just scroll down to the next question.

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How can I FAX WITHOUT THE PHONE BILL™.?

If you have a broadband Internet connection please complete this form to obtain further information.

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How does the recipient benefit from PLUSFAX?

The recipient receives incoming faxes via email or Instant Messenger. This enhances privacy and saves the cost of manual fax distribution and the many associated inefficencies such as lost or mislaid documents, delays, and fax machine snooping. The recipient can also be location independent by using a world-wide-web-based email inbox. It also saves paper and avoids the necessity of photocopying or scanning incoming faxes, for which many organisations spend substantial sums.

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What do I need to send EMail and Instant Messages from a regular fax machine ?

TO SEND EMail and Instant Messages from a regular fax machine all you need is :

- a PLUSFAX™ Cover Page
- the paper document to be sent and
- a working fax machine.

TO PRINT PLUSFAX™ Cover Pages you will need :

- a personal computer running any Microsoft Windows operating system except 3.1
- a browser connected to the Internet or an Intranet PLUSFAX™ Router
- a laser or ink-jet printer.

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Do I need an E-Mail Address to use PLUSFAX™ ?

YES

An email address is essential, but only because we use it to identify you.

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Do I need an Internet Connection to send PLUSFAXes™ ?

NO.

All you need is the paper document to be sent, a working fax machine and the PLUSFAX™ Cover Page.

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What kind of printer should I use ?

You MUST use either a laser or ink-jet printer with a resolution of at least 300 dpi (dots per inch).

Needle printers do NOT work reliably for printing the pages

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Can I use the same PLUSFAX™ Cover Page more than once ?

YES, the pages are re-usable as often as you like for up to 30 days from the day you print them.

Keep in mind you MUST use the original page from your printer. Foto or facsimile copies may not work reliably due to distortions in the copying process.

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Must my PC be attached to the fax machine in some way ?

NO.

In fact your PC need not be anywhere near the fax machine.

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How do I know if the recipient received my PLUSFAX™ ?

You must select "Request a receipt" when you print the PLUSFAX™ Cover Page™

When a recipient opens a PLUSFAX™ on the Secure Delivey Web Server you will be notified immediately. If your fax is delivered by email your recipient may, at his or her discretion, return to your email address a 'Read Receipt'.

If you are experiencing delivery problems please start by reading the 'most frequent problems section' of this FAQ.

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What about privacy ?

The information printed in the matrix on the PLUSFAX™ Cover Page is encrypted prior to printing and decrypted by the PLUSFAX™ server. It would already be a substantial task to decipher the data matrix without this encryption.

EMail messages over the Internet are not private but delivery direct to the recipient's desktop may be preferable to a shared fax machine that is freely accessible to snoopers..

If you need TOTAL PRIVACY for transmission over the Internet please contact our sales office who have some solutions.

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Is there a maximum number of recipients ?

YES.

The current limit is set at 30 for subscribers. If you are performing a free evaluation of the public service you are limited to five PLUSFAX™es.

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Can I use PLUSFAX™ to send a fax to an Internet Enabled Fax Machine ?

YES.

Internet Enabled Fax Machines compliant with the ITU T37 standard for Internet Facsimile Transmission should automatically print regular plain text email messages and tif image files.

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What are the most frequent sources of problems ?

As with regular faxing THE MOST FREQUENT PROBLEM is a message with the WRONG ADDRESS.
If you request a receipt and delivery is by Instant Messenger you will receive a Delivery Notification in your email inbox. If delivery is to an email address you may be sent a receipt at the recipient's discretion.

We do occasionaly encounter other problems. Usually they are caused by one of the following.

THE NO-NO LIST.

1 Fax Machines that feed more than one page at a time.
When such a fax arrives at the PLUSFAX™ server it may assume that a page is missing and the document will not be sent. If your fax machine does this frequently please have it serviced or buy a new one if it is worn out. If it's new, send it back to the manufacturer!

2 Old or dirty fax machines that send more speckles than not.
PLUSFAX™ is very resilient to speckles on the pages, but heavy speckling all over the page is asking a bit too much, so please make sure the fax machine reading element is clean and operating to specification !

2 Excessive 'Noise' on your phone line.
If your fax machine operates to specification but you are still sending heavily speckled faxes then you may have a 'noisy' telephone connection, so please have it checked.

3 Colored paper is NOT a good idea. With a clean white background PLUSFAX™ functions impeccably.

4 Fotocopied PLUSFAX™ CoverPages. You MUST use the original Pages created by your printer.

5 Facsimile copies of PLUSFAX™ CoverPages. You MUST use the original Pages created by your printer.

6 Needle or Dot matrix printers. You MUST use a laser or ink-jet printer.

And in case you were wondering, we have not yet encountered a printer or fax machine that skews the paper enough to make the data irretrievable and yes, if you inadvertently fax with the pages inverted or out of sequence the message can usually be delivered.

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What is a 'Valid PLUSFAX™ Document' ?

A VALID PLUSFAX™ Document is composed of -

The FIRST page

must be an original PLUSFAX™ Cover Page printed on white paper using a laser or ink-jet printer

Subsequent Page(s)

may be any faxable paper document composed of from 0 to 50 pages. If the PLUSFAX™ Cover Page contains a message and there are no subsequent pages the message will be transmitted to the recipients. If the PLUSFAX™ Cover Page does not contain a message and there are no subsequent pages a Negative Routing Notification will be sent to the sender.

Examples of NOT-VALID documents are :-

A single PLUSFAX™ Cover Page without a message;
A document without an PLUSFAX™ Cover Page.
A document with more than one PLUSFAX™ Cover Page.
A document with a PLUSFAX™ Cover Page that is a photo or facsimile copy of the original Cover Page;

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How much does PLUSFAX™ cost ?

Please go here for a description of the various payment plans.
If you or your company send a lot of faxes go here to learn how to eliminate the phone bill.

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What is the Fax Machine STATION ID ?

Every modern Fax Machine is programmed to store self-identifying information. This typically includes the personal and or company name of the sender and the number of the telephone line to which the fax machine is attached. This 'Station ID' is set up by the user of the fax machine and the information is permanently stored in the Fax Machine's memory. When a fax is transmitted the Station ID is sent with every page and appears as part of the very first line of small print at the top of every received page. In the absence of any other sender information the PLUSFAX™ server attempts to send negative Routing Notifications to the number contained in the Station ID. We would strongly recommend you ensure that the Station ID is current and that the number be surrounded by # signs for easy extraction. It should of course include both country and area codes. e.g. New York USA #1 212 202 4311# e.g. London England #44 207 123 4567#.

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Is there a maximum message size ?

YES

The maximum message size is 393 bytes for SMS compatibility.

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What is an 'Un-listed Server' ?

We can provide you with your own private local or 1-800 server number. We can also provide alternative solutions with end-to-end encryption and FAX WITHOUT A PHONE BILL™. Please contact our sales office for further information.

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Can you trace a fax that did not arrive ?

Sometimes

The most frequent reason for mis-directed faxes is an incorrect recipient E-Mail Address. If you fax us a document without a PLUSFAX™ Cover Page it will be returned if you are a subscriber and the server can identify the sender from the fax machine's station ID. If you are a Service subscriber and send us the correct information we will attempt to establish what happened to your message. See Support Services for details on how and where to send support requests.

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Can PLUSFAX™ be used to broadcast regular faxes ?

YES

PLUSFAX™ will send to any mix of up to 30 email addresses and fax numbers. If you prepare a PLUSFAX™ Cover Page containing only fax numbers any additional pages (not the PLUSFAX™ Cover Page) will be broadcast to the recipients' fax machines. This is much simpler and more flexible than setting up a fax machine for broadcasting. In addition the fax itself is sent only once from the originating fax machine, which saves both time and money. For international faxing savings can be substantial as final delivery takes place from a fax server in the USA where international telecom charges are lower than in most other countries.
You will need a special account. Please contact our sales office for further information.

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Can PLUSFAX™ deliver e-mail messages and paper documents securely over the Internet ?

YES

You will need a special account. Please contact our sales office for further information.

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How can PLUSFAX™ save millions of trees.?

In 2001 the world sent around 550,000,000,000 fax pages. This is forecast to grow at 13% CAGR through 2006.

Over 90% of these fax pages are sent from one fax machine to another. For every page sent another is printed by the receiving machine, hence the annual consumption of paper is around a trillion... 1,000,000,000,000 pages.

A 'standard' tree (loblolly pine) provides 10,000 pages so faxing consumes the equivalent of around 100,000,000 trees a year.

When everyone in the world uses PLUSFAX™ only the sender will be consuming paper, not the recipient, hence the world will consume 500 billion fewer paper pages potentially saving around 50 million trees per year.

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How does PLUSFAX™ simplify fax broadcasting.?

Setting up a fax machine to send the same fax to multiple recipients can be very complicated and is prone to error. With PLUSFAX™ subscribers can use their existing MS Outlook and Outlook Express Address Books to select any mix of email addresses and fax numbers and broadcast the document by dialling just one number on the fax machine.
You will need a special account. Please contact our sales office for further information.

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Can I use my existing MS Outlook or Outlook Express Address Book to prepare a PLUSFAX™ Cover Page?

YES

You can select PLUSFAX™ recipients from your MS Outlook or Outlook Address Book then use 'drag and drop' onto PLUSFAX™ for Windows to print the PLUSFAX™ Cover Page.
To try it go here.
For more detail go here.
For other Address Books please contact our sales office for further information.

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How can PLUSFAX™ deliver faster than a regular fax.?

Most organizations manually distribute incoming faxes twice a day. With PLUSFAX™ your document is delivered direct to the recipient's desktop computer, avoiding the classic 'where's my fax' problem. (Your client just faxed you, now s/he calls you to talk about it but the fax is somewhere in the manual delivery system.)

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How does PLUSFAX™ save photocopying and scanning costs.?

Many organizations make copies of all outgoing documents. By specifying a your own email address for a blind copy (bcc) of all outgoing PLUSFAX™es your inbox will receive an image file of every outgoing document. You can then store it in an appropriate location on your hard drive.
You can even arrange for a copy of the outgoing document to be stored in a specific folder in a document imaging system. For this you will need a special account. Please contact our sales office for further information.

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How can PLUSFAX™ reduce the number of my phone lines.?

PLUSFAX™ saves broadcast transmission time as the fax is transmitted just once, whereas programming your fax machine for broadcasting causes a separate transmission for every recipient, taking longer and costing more. If you have several or many fax machines you can reduce the number you require and eliminate some telephone lines.

It is also possible to completely eliminate all outgoing fax lines. Please email our sales department for more information on faxing without getting a phone bill.

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Why not just use my VOIP setup for faxing?

The main reason is that it that it hardly ever works. Even when it does a page can easily take a couple of minutes to transmit and you may find difficulty sending multipage documents.
Go here for a detailed explanation of why not.

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