As church communicators, you probably encountered scan and fax systems as a means to connect with your congregation and other churches as well. But is it necessary to have one or both? Where do we need to use them?
In the age of email and other technological advancements, here’s what our members’ experiences with their churches’ scan and fax system needs.
Comments:
“For our office, we need to exchange documents from other parishes around the world. There are areas of the globe where fax machines are the pinnacle of technology.” Kelly Mason McClintock
“We scan and email everything in our printer. We do not pay for the fax option. Only caution, anything that you scan gets stored in your copier. Make sure you wipe the hard drive before getting rid of the copier if you use your printer this way.” Charlotte Walkowe Myers
“We use the fax on a regular basis for our daycare. Both the doctors” offices and our state Care 4 Kids system require faxes. Outside of that, I think it’s’ site’s been twice in 8 years that I’ve been asked to fax something.” Charity Lane
“When we got our new printer, we totally forgot about the fax. In over a year, there’s only been one time where someone insisted on fax instead of email. (We went to a church member’s business to fax it.)” Beverly Myers
“No fax, only the scan to email option on our printer. For those that absolutely must fax, use free apps on their phone. It has happened 2x in the year I’ve worked at our church and both cases were for personal use.” Lindsi Hartley
“We must have fax for our preschool for the same reasons mentioned, immunization records. Plus, our 403b provider wants enrollment paperwork by fax. It’s built into our copier, so no big deal or wasted space.” Miranda Dobbins Green
“We dropped our fax line several years ago. As you said, we’ll scan and email things. Haven’t’ t run into anything we can’t’ t email over to someone.” Tyson Nofzinger
Conclusion
Although it’s more convenient to scan and email relevant documents, we must always consider what the receiver prefers. As mentioned by others in the post, there are places in the world that don’t have the resources to switch to a scanner. Before deciding to let go of a fax system in your church, you must be sure that all of the people and organizations that your church connects to prefer and have the capability to receive a document via email. And that they would be able to send you scanned papers as well.
Let us know in the comments if your church still uses a fax machine!
