Need a new Japanese-friendly digital fax service

[Matthew Schlecht]

I need a new Japanese-friendly digital fax service.
I would welcome any suggestions for a suitable replacement for the one I currently have.
The one I have worked with for over 10 years, eFax [myportal.efax.com], has completely redone their interface.
It seems that they feel it's an improvement, but I tried it out today and it failed at every step. Initially it wouldn't even let me log in with my extant credentials, and it was downhill from there.
It won't accept Japanese characters in the name field ("the entered value is invalid"), and even after I rendered everything in romaji, their new system was unhappy and the "Send" button remained grayed out.

Settings does allow the selection of Japanese as the preferred language, but making that selection makes no difference.
After initially describing my problem to their automated system, it was unable to address the problem, and I was waitlisted on their chat module for almost an hour before it spat out the response that no one (human) was available to help with my problem and closed my chat window.
So, I called their help line, their automated system discouraged me from waiting on hold and gave me the option to be called back when it was my turn. That was 3 hours ago.

So, I need a new digital fax service, and any suggestions would be welcome.

Matthew Schlecht, PhD
Word Alchemy Translation, Inc.
Newark, DE, USA
wordalchemytranslation.com

[John Stroman]

Matthew,

If you are in a bind right now, you can check out:

https://www.ifaxapp.com/blog/the-best-online-fax-service/

Although this is a self-promotional blurb for ifax, it has a free trial button.

I can't vouch for any of the suggested service companies.

John Stroman

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[Matthew Schlecht]

A brief follow-up on this fax issue, and many thanks to John S for the prompt suggestions.

This was a case of immediate need; rarely the best conditions under which to make a service decision.

Anyway, after surveying several possibilities I selected Fax.to and enrolled for a trial period.

As is par for the course, their promotional material failed to clarify the true costs and limitations. Along with the monthly service fee of ~$22 (after the 4-day trial period), I discovered that there is a per-transmission fee of ~$0.15. Also, it was never made clear to me that I would receive my very own Japanese fax number to use for return faxing. After an initial abortive attempt at usage, I canceled the service.

I again attempted to contact eFax customer service and this time was successful in reaching a human.

After describing my problems with their new and improved user interface (rejects Japanese input), and documenting same with screen captures, the representative assured me that she would pass that information along to their development team.

In the meantime, she gave me a link to use their legacy interface.

So, I am happily back where I started. At least until the next wonderfully improved user interface version comes along.

Matthew Schlecht, PhD
Word Alchemy Translation, Inc.
Newark, DE, USA
wordalchemytranslation.com

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