Not All MFP Fax Apps and Connectors Are Created Equal

The usefulness as a sales tool of adding new functions (translation, etc.) to smart MFPs pales in comparison to another way to leverage apps and connectors: dramatically improving core MFP functions. Your customers rely on their MFPs to copy, fax, print, and scan. Imagine how delighted they’d be if you could make your MFPs do what they do best…better?

Fax Kits Hold Your Customers (and Your Sales) Back

Demand for fax isn’t shrinking, it’s actually increasing. The key thing to remember is that the technology is also evolving. Most MFPs today still do their faxing through fax kits hooked to analog phone lines. Those “wires in the wall” are a problem for several reasons.

First of all, analog phone lines are expensive in an age when more and more organizations are upgrading to less expensive VoIP technology. Maintaining them purely for fax transmissions increases customers’ costs (and thus their pain points) when using your products.

Secondly, fax kits are antiquated technology. When additional devices, such as ATAs (Analog Telephone Adapters), are added to allow them to connect to digital telephone systems, they become notoriously unreliable. When they fail to do their job, customers aren’t likely to see the distinction between the fax kit, ATA, and the MFP as a whole. That makes your product look bad, and it makes you look bad.

Finally, while the fax communications medium is so healthy because of industries’ regulatory requirements (HIPAA, GDPR, FERPA, SOX, etc.), fax boards don’t deliver key features that make compliance easier.

The Future of Fax Is Now

XM Fax, awarded Buyers Lab’s “Outstanding MFP Fax Solution,” is the industry-leading Fax over IP (FoIP) solution. It features easy-to-install, secure apps and connectors supporting Xerox, Toshiba, Ricoh, Sharp, Lexmark, Kyocera, and HP (coming soon) that will help solve all of those problems. They make your customers’ lives easier while putting more money in your pocket.

Fax over IP solutions harness your customer’s internet connection. That means no analog phone line costs, no busy signals, no waiting at the MFP for confirmation pages while the fax transmits at one page per minute. As a result, you’re saving them lots of time and money. XM Fax doesn’t use fax kits/boards, dramatically increasing reliability, reducing service calls, and keeping your valuable reputation intact.

Incoming faxes can be routed directly to email, applications, or network folders so they don’t sit exposed in the output tray, vulnerable until someone comes to collect them. If exposure of inbound pages is not a concern for your client, XM Fax can also route faxes to print on any device within the organization.

MFP fax kits work as independent, siloed communications devices. When one sends or receives a fax over an analog line, only the machines on each side of the transmission know what happened. This can make tracking communications (for usage statistics, security, and regulatory compliance) difficult – you can have as many reports to consolidate as you have kits!

With XM Fax, all destinations, times, and confirmation receipts are tracked and recorded automatically, making it easy for organizations to know how the solution is being used. This presents a ready-made audit trail in case of a regulatory investigation or compliance audit.

Beware the Hidden Security Risks of Other FoIP Solutions

Not all connectors and apps are created equal. A key distinction is how they get transmissions off the MFP and on to on-premises fax servers or cloud services. XMedius MFP software solutions exclusively use HTTPS (secure and encrypted delivery), instead of SMTP (email store and forward), which many other fax providers use. Because email is inherently insecure, using SMTP significantly increases the risk of security breaches and is in non-compliance with many regulations, like HIPAA.

Be sure you’re selling the right solutions. That keeps them clear from regulatory fines, the excruciating walk of shame in the media, and lawsuits. The XM Fax solution (either on-premises or in the cloud) will empower and delight all your SMB and enterprise customers.

Fix Fax to Promote Profits

Fax isn’t going away and is an essential element of all enterprise communication portfolios. In some cases, it is even mission critical and essential to meet regulation requirements. Fax doesn’t have to be painful for your customers, and that means it doesn’t have to drag your sales and maintenance down.

Don’t lead your customer into a technological dead-end sprinkled with frustrations. Ditch the kits and switch to a modern fax software or cloud solution. With reductions in maintenance visits, phone line charges, and consumable costs, as well as greater ease of management, it can quickly pay for itself.