Anybody know anything about Fax Software?

[Doramius]

Get this, I do a search and I get companies willing to do my auto faxing for me, but this is what I want to do myself.
I got 2000 fax numbers, 1 dedicated fax line (I have the ability for 2-4 lines) with unlimited local & long distance, and my PC. I have Fax documents I want to send to about 400 numbers a day, so it'll be 2000 total numbers by Friday. The next week it'll start over with a new document. The numbers are of people who want to receive this fax weekly.

My question, I need a fax software where I can enter these numbers and it will automatically dial, in sequence, each of the numbers and send these documents. Assuming it takes 1 minute to fax this one pager to all 400 people, it should take about 1 normal business day of running. Does fax software like this exist? And where can I find it? Google has been no help.

[Supreme2k]

Try this, then read my sig :P

[ZAPPER]

http://thefaxcompany.com/index2.htm


It looks like there are a few services out there.

[Doramius]

These are both decent, but they are Fax Hardware for multiple lines (IE: I need 300 lines to send 1 page to 300 numbers). Or they are a service where I send my document and they fax it out for me. The cost is way too much. I've heard of a software, but can't find it, where only 1 line is required and it just sends to all your numbers, by taking about 1 min per number to send the fax.

Good job checking though.

[Shadowmistress]

Winfax does what you want. http://www.symantec.com/home_homeoffice/products/remote_pc_fax/wfp10/index.html

Single phone line, you set the phone list or can have it imported from windows address book and it batch faxes unattended. Has preview window and you can also edit the fax somewhat, has cover page templates, keeps track of what went through successfully and what failed to connect, has automatic connection retry, can receive faxes, and is organized kind of like an email program.

I got it bundled with my old comp and can't live without it.

[jimmalenko]

You can even do it with just Windows XP's Fax Services and any modem. I've got this set up at work, as I fax a different document every day to the same 10 numbers, all without ever leaving my PC, or generating a hard copy of the fax first. You basically just install the Fax Service (from Add/Remove Programs > Windows Components), which sets up a printer called "Fax", and when you Print to Fax, it just sends the fax. I use a distribution list set up in Microsoft Outlook and just import it in through the Send Fax wizard.


... and best of all - completely freeeeee.

[ofbarea]

As Shadowmistress says, Symantec Win Fax pro is the way to go.

[Doramius]

I was looking at those and they seem to be the way to go. I just need to figure out how it'll let me dump an excel spreadsheet of numbers properly into it's book. 2000 numbers is a lot. WinFax does mass faxing, but I haven't seen any special timing feature (YET). The timing feature would be nice to do the 400 faxes a day plan I had in mind, but if it works, it works.

Obviously, computer faxing is a new thing for me. I think email is better, but some Old Fart Mom & Pop Businesses don't have the equipment for email or have email setup. What do they think this is? The 80's?!!!! How archaic.

[Shadowmistress]

I just opened winfax up and looked around. You can import your whole list in one shot - along with first and last names, title, alternate phone number, company name, etc - by simply copying it to a txt file. Just highlight in excel and copy to notepad. Winfax will recognize the fields in notepad and sort everything accordingly. I did a little test run and I'm amazed at how simple it was. It would take you 2 minutes to get the whole 2000 numbers in there.

It also has the ability to sort the numbers into groups so that once you set it up, you send out 1 fax and all your 400 customers get it. You can mix and match groups as well and all the numbers stay in memory.

It has a schedule option available as well which lets you specify the date and time (down to the second) when you want it to start faxing a particular document. You could conceivably set up the whole week's faxing in one shot and just walk away and it will deliver at the proper date and time. This feature also allows you to enter billing codes as well.

Remarkable software. I never knew it could do all this until I looked just now.

[Doramius]

KEWL! THANK YOU MUCH.

I'll be browsing more of those features later today. This is going to Rock! Thanks again.



I'm such a FAX NOOB!!!!

[Shadowmistress]

'welcome.

[Dr. DOS]

At the last company I was at we used RightFax.... I would create mail merged documents with bracketed headers in the top section of the 400 page word doc I created that housed the phone number [1-215-333-3333].. One page for each person I was sending. Mail merge done with Word and Access. I then 'fed' the word doc into the rightfax system and it would parse out the 400 pages, read the header and send that particular page to that person. it worked great.

[bigmicka]

we use winfax on a machine with 2 modems attached, access application that sends reports to different fax numbers. we can do around 20,000 faxes a week depending on what work has been done during that time.

mic

[pchan]

we can do around 20,000 faxes a week depending on what work has been done during that time.
mic

Mercy ! Pls send to fax server and not fax machines.