Phone and fax number combined?

[Icarus]

I rarely use a fax and while a fax line doesn't cost much I probably only send/recieve one a week so in a way it works out very expensive.

How many here use one number to combine both their fax and voice calls? How do you think it looks when there is one number for both?

 

[dam099]

I don't use one number for fax and voice so I can't comment on that. As a potential customer I think if I came across a business that had the one number for phone and fax I would assume it was quite small, but thats not necessarily always a negative thing.

I assume you are paying Eircom EUR24 per month for a second line for your fax. If this is the case then Blueface (a VOIP phone provider) offer a virtual fax number for EUR5 a month. They give you for example a Dublin number and when someone faxes to it it gets converted to a PDF file and emailed to your email address. You can then print this off or read on screen as needed. You could still use your fax machine for outgoing faxes just change the headers to show the virtual fax number.

I have only got their fax service recently so I have only received a few test faxes so far but it seems to work OK. I have used their VOIP product for a while and am fairly satisfied with it. I don't even think you need to sign up for one of their other monthly packages they seem to offer it to Pay As You Go customers aswell so you could sign up for PAYG and never actually use the VOIP product if you didn't want to (though it has attractions in its own right).

One drawback might be if you don't have broadband you may not be receiving emails as promptly as the fax would have been received but there are ways around this (e.g. use an email address that sends text alerts to your mobile)

 

[Icarus]

Hi Dam099,
It's funny to get your reply as it is actually Blueface that I have at the moment! My initial plan was to go entirely with them but I'm about to spend a small fortune on print and web material and I really can't risk having a number that I may have to change. My Bueface fax service is great, sending is slightly fiddly but overall I'm very happy with it.

My issue is with the fact that the main number is VOIP. I'm nervous about my broadband going down or the company going out of business. I rang €ircom and asked would it be possible to port my number over to them and they said no. This means that if Blueface go bust the line will die and be irretrievable (which seemed a little odd to be honest!). Have you had any problems with dropped calls or bad sound quality on your Blueface lines?

Maybe the problem is that I am being a typically conservative consumer! Just because €ircom have been round years doesn't mean they're great!

 

[dam099]

Hi Dam099,
It's funny to get your reply as it is actually Blueface that I have at the moment! My initial plan was to go entirely with them but I'm about to spend a small fortune on print and web material and I really can't risk having a number that I may have to change. My Bueface fax service is great, sending is slightly fiddly but overall I'm very happy with it.

My issue is with the fact that the main number is VOIP. I'm nervous about my broadband going down or the company going out of business. I rang €ircom and asked would it be possible to port my number over to them and they said no. This means that if Blueface go bust the line will die and be irretrievable (which seemed a little odd to be honest!). Have you had any problems with dropped calls or bad sound quality on your Blueface lines?

Maybe the problem is that I am being a typically conservative consumer! Just because €ircom have been round years doesn't mean they're great!

Is your phone and fax number with Blueface the same? I have two different numbers one for each.

I have some issues from time to time with Blueface but I am using a wireless ISP, when I have problems it is often because my pings through the ISP (to everywhere) are gone to hell not anything I could attribute to Blueface. That said I don't know if I was in business if I would chance Blueface as my main provider but they are useful to keep down outgoing call costs and given your light volume of faxes I thought they could be useful for that too. I'd agree sending is a bit fiddly it would be nice if you could email Word files as well as text and PDF's, I find that most the faxes I want to send were typed in Word and I then need to convert these to PDFs.

I hadn't really considered the printing issues but obviously that is a factor to be considered (I wouldn't worry much about the web material thats easy to amend).

 

[Icarus]

Hi Dam099,
I have 2 Blueface numbers, one for fax and one for voice. My basic plan is to get an Eircom main number for the reasons already listed. While my web info may be easily changable it's still pretty bad when some one has a number for you on file that no longer works.

I considered staying with the Blueface number for faxes but it is a completely different geographical Dublin number to the one that Eircom will give me so I just think it will look like I'm using a virtual office service.

Like yourself, I also plan on using Blueface to keep down the cost of outgoing calls. It really is possible to make some serious savings by combining the two.

 

[Capaill]

Icarus

I find Blueface quite good for my own business and have the two voice and one fax line option.

Regarding losing calls if the broadband goes down, well you could always dial up into your blueface admin panel and forward all calls to your mobile while the problem is fixed.

If the company goes bust, well then that is a completly different issue but one that applies to all providers.

getting all your business material may not prove too expensive if you use internet based services for your printing such as www.vistaprint.ie whom I have used myself in the past and found to be quite good.

C

 

[Icarus]

Hi Capaill,
Do you use your Blueface numbers as the only numbers that you give to clients and customers?

I'm presently planning to rent Eircom lines for incoming but keep my bills done by using Blueface for outgoing.

 

[Capaill]

Icarus

under the plan I am using, Blueface gave me two lines which map to numbers in the 01 area code (where I am located) I give out one of the numbers as the main company number for people to contact me on.

Depending on the number of people you have in the office I would stick with Blueface for both incoming and outgoing. If your link goes done, worst case incoing calls get answered by voice mail, best case you divert to a mobile phone as mentioned above. By not having lines from Eircom you keep your costs down further.

C