eFax is owned by J2 Global Communications who also own Fax.com, Send2Fax, DataOnCall, jConnect, RapidFAX and SmartFax amoungst others. eFax

eFax offers a good selection of features via their web portal and very good application integration via their desktop application called eFax Messanger.

Their standard package 'eFax Plus' allows you to receive 130 free and send 30 faxes per month. You can have upto 5 email addresses associated with each fax number for sending and recieveing and an unlimited number of fax numbers (for example, one in each country / city you do business in) can be linked to an individual account.

There are also free, pro and corporate packages available.

On the downside, overage is expensive and customer support is abysmal in some areas. Some people report intermittent slow send times.

Overall it is a great product backed by a company that has been in the internet faxing industry for over 20 years. If it wasn't for the poor customer service this would be the number one choice.

Both the desktop software and the online portal are easy to navigate and use. The desktop software installs a 'fax printer' which allows sending of faxes from any application that has a print function. There is also an option to 'Scan and Fax' if you have a scanner attached to your PC.

Faxes are sent in black and white and there are 2 grades: standard and fine. Fax receipts can be sent to any of the email addresses registered with the account. A cover page can be included and this can be changed and customised in the preferences. Upto 5 documents can also be attached to each fax. A full list of supported file formats is here.

Inbound faxes can be viewed online, via the eFax Messenger software or via email. Faxes with the .EFX extension can only be read via eFax Messenger. Most faxes arrive in either PDF or TIFF format. The quality is very good. Inbound faxes can also be password protected.

Fax activity can be tracked online and faxes cab=n be resent from the sent faxes log.

Multiple fax numbers and email addresses can be associated with each account which makes management of multiple numbers very easy.

eFax offers 3 packages as shown below:

Plan	eFax Pro	eFax Plus	eFax Free
Online fax storage	2 years	1 year	30 days
Included pages Received Only	200 / mth	130 / mth 30 outbound	20 / mth
Cost to send faxes	$0.10 / page	$0.10 / page	Cannot Send
Fax file formats	PDF TIFF	PDF TIFF	EFX via eFax Messenger
Overage Cost: Recieving	$0.10 / page	$0.10 / page	N/A
Overage Cost: Sending	$0.15 / page	$0.15 / page	N/A
Customer service	Phone email	Phone email	email only
Emails that can receive faxes	5	5	1
Free centralised fax management software
Free Desktop Fax Software
Cost	$19.95 / mth	$16.95 / mth	Free

Hidden Cost: If you choose a toll-free fax number then the cost to receive faxes is $0.20 per page.

eFaxCorporate handles faxing for companies with larger requirements.

You can be up and running in under 5 minutes via the web portal and not much longer if you want to download and install the desktop software: eFax Messenger.

Both are very easy to use and configure. Customising a cover page is a little more tricky and required a good hunt through the online help but there are plenty of pre-prepared cover pages already available which can be used as templates.

As mensioned abov, fax traffic tracking is easily handled via the online logs and faxes can even be resent from the sent log.

There have been reports of bad customer service from eFax. However, our experience of them has been very good. The live chat was helpful and the telephone support was good. In both cases they answered all our questions. During the telephone conversation we requested some information be sent to us and it was emailed within the hour. The online documentation and FAQ sections are informative and reasonably expansive. It would be good to see some turorials or webinars made available but that is more a 'nice to have' rather than a major omission.

Even the cancellation process - via a toll-free call - was pleasant and the operator offered us an additional 2 months free service if we stayed with them.

eFax offers an excellent service. The coverage is second-to-none with more cities covered than any other product currently reviewed. The interface is straight-forward and easy to use from the start. The ability to have multiple fax numbers and emails on a single account is also great. However, eFax also has the most expensive packages we have reviewed and offers the least amount of included pages. It is a shame that the largest player in the internet faxing field could not come up with more attractive pricing for their customers. That being said, if you want to use the premium service that has the greatest coverage and largest customer base then eFax is for you.