Bitkom, the German IT sector association, recently conducted a survey to determine the extent to which German companies are still sending faxes. The outcome: 77 percent of all companies are communicating via fax, and 25 percent responded that they are using fax often or very often. There are very good reasons for this.
“Of the companies still using fax, 56 percent state that fax is indispensable for communicating with authorities. In addition, 43 percent opt for fax because it’s safer than using the postal service, while 35 percent are sticking with fax because they have excellently functioning, well-established fax processes. While 27 percent responded that they are using fax because they are accustomed to using the channel, an equal number revealed that they generally need confirmation that the message has been delivered,” Bitkom states in a recent press release. Other arguments for using fax mentioned in the survey were customer requirements (25 percent), legal provisions (10 percent) as well as security (7 percent) and backup for digital systems (6 percent). On the whole, Bitkom specialist Daniil Heinze goes on to say, the use of fax at German companies seems to have been on the decline for many years now, but this trend is surprisingly slow-moving.
However, some of the other statements in Bitkom’s statement could easily be misinterpreted. Many companies are no longer using fax machines at all anymore (neither analog nor digital), but are nevertheless still sending faxes – for instance via cloud fax solutions such as those offered by Retarus. Seen from a technical perspective, the service still transmits an image file, which the recipient receives directly in their email inbox as an attachment, often in PDF format, thanks to Fax2Mail. Inversely, emails or their attachments can be sent effortlessly via Mail2Fax, directly from email programs such as Outlook (rather than using individual email clients, multi-function printers can also be used to replace the former stand-alone fax machines). Practically no faxes are sent out “conventionally via the telephone line” anymore, as all providers have switched their networks over to internet technology in the meanwhile.
A recent article in Germany’s Süddeutsche Zeitung broadsheet refers to the Bitkom press release. Under the headline “Fax will outlive Facebook”, the article claims that the continued popularity of the fax points to a failure of the IT sector. So far “no company has managed to implement legally compliant digital signatures in such a way that is easy and secure enough to replace fax”.
To start with, the author also criticizes those “cranks, drunk on technology” who notoriously frame fax as anachronistic and backward, preferably via social media. Whatever their reasons may be, this sort of person would like to equate using a technology which has been functioning for decades with refusing to accept progress.
However, Retarus’ customers have long had a much more powerful insight: Fax and progress don’t contradict each other in the least, but rather open up totally new opportunities for digital transformation and the automation of business processes.
