chgoeditor

It just occurred to me that I'm paying about $120 a year for a fax number that receives less than one fax a month. I don't want to give up the number entirely, but would like to cut my costs. Can anyone recommend a free online fax service to which I could port my fax number?

There's no dispute that faxing is a technology on decline, so my greatest worry is that I'd port to a company which goes out of business, making it difficult/impossible for me to keep my phone number/port to a new provider. It's been my business fax number for eons, so I can't even imagine how many people have the number...losing it would be a pain in the neck.

(If it matters, my only concern is receiving faxes. I have another landline I can use to send faxes if necessary.)

Dubai Stu

Your problem is that eFax which has swallowed up a number of the other services not only doesn't allow porting of numbers, but hits you with fines for trying. If you have them, read their terms and conditions. They are ugly.

Onesuite isn't free, but has a very cheap virtual fax service with phone numbers in most area codes.

linsj

Bumping this older thread for more recent recommendations. (I can't be the only business owner who needs to keep a fax number.)

Any experience with Ring Central? The price is right.

antichef

In the absence of anybody posting anything local to you, I have used this UK company for years and am a happy user ^
http://www.voipfone.co.uk/Email_To_Fax.php

They took over the long established UK land line number that I used to have as a fax number. For price comparison land line rental is about £16.00/month, but the VoipFone fax service costs me £2.40 per month. Two main contacts use lots of fax so I need to keep it.

When someone sends a fax to my old number the VoipFone service sends it to my email as a PDF file. That means I can pick it up anywhere and forward it etc from my phone or laptop. The "traditional" fax required me to pick up a piece of paper at a machine in another country, so this was a godsend as well as a moneysaver when I found it.

They let you get overseas numbers too, which is why I posted this level of detail. You might be able to fix something with them!
http://www.voipfone.co.uk/PB_Incomin...ne_Numbers.php
By the look of things even changing to a US freefone number with them for your fax might be cheaper than your current plan if not used much.

Dubai Stu

My first piece of advice for US users would be that if you port the number in you have a better chance at porting the number out. Even JFax/eFax lets you keep a number your brought with you. Second, many VOIP providers let you take a number and use it as an inbound fax number. It is a flip on/flip off service. This puts you in a better position to fight the argument that JFax makes which is that the special category of service they offer is not covered by number portability rules. Your ability to see that you also take calls on it occasionally and make outbound calls on it undercuts the argument.

Callcentric's numbers can be usesd as a virtual fax number.

boberonicus

Porting numbers to new carriers is a (sometimes painful) process. The providers I've worked with have dedicated number porting departments. So I think you'll be hard pressed to find a company that will do that for free.

To cut your costs by over 50%, you could port your number to Vitelity.com and use their vFax service, I've found it to be pretty reliable.