Fax never really died. It just stopped living next to the copier.
Healthcare, legal, finance, real estate, and government still rely on fax because certain partners, regulators, and workflows demand it. What has changed is the tolerance for analog phone lines, jammed machines, and mystery toner purchases.
That gap is exactly why web fax services exist.
A web fax service lets users send and receive faxes digitally through a browser, email, mobile app, or integration, while still delivering documents over the traditional fax network when required. Same destination. Less chaos.
What are web fax services?
Web fax services, sometimes called online fax or cloud fax, allow organizations to send and receive faxes over the internet instead of using physical fax machines and analog lines.
In practice, that means:
Outbound faxes are sent from email, a web portal, a mobile app, or API
Inbound faxes arrive digitally, usually as PDFs
Fax numbers can be new or ported from existing providers
Platforms like Viirtue treat fax as just another cloud service. No hardware. No dedicated phone lines. No scavenger hunt for cover sheets.
How web fax services actually work
Most web fax platforms follow the same behind-the-scenes flow:
You’re assigned a fax number, either brand new or ported
A user uploads or emails a document, or sends it via an integration
The provider converts that file into fax format
The document is delivered over the global fax network
Inbound faxes are received digitally with timestamps, metadata, and delivery status
To the sender and recipient, it still feels like a fax. To IT, it finally behaves like modern software.
Why businesses still buy web fax services
Fax persists for a few very unglamorous reasons:
Some industries and partners still mandate fax
Fax is viewed as a known, accepted delivery method for sensitive documents
Replacing fax outright can break long-standing workflows
Web fax removes the operational drag without forcing customers to rewire their entire process.
For MSPs, it also checks a very practical box: it’s a low-friction add-on that increases monthly recurring revenue and fits naturally alongside voice, UCaaS, and managed services.
Web fax services checklist: what actually matters
Not all web fax platforms are created equal. These are the areas that tend to matter in the real world.
Security and access control
At a minimum, look for:
Role-based access (send, view, download permissions)
Audit logs and activity history
Encryption and secure document storage
If your customers operate in regulated environments, compliance alignment matters. In healthcare, for example, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services outlines safeguards for protecting electronic protected health information, which influences how fax data should be handled.
Delivery, tracking, and reliability
Fax failures still happen. The difference is whether you can see them.
Look for:
Delivery confirmations and failure notifications
Retry logic for busy signals or transmission issues
Clear uptime expectations and public status visibility
Silence is not a feature when documents are time-sensitive.
User experience
Adoption lives or dies here.
The best web fax services support:
Fax from email
A simple web portal for sending and receiving
Mobile access for remote staff
Saved contacts and reusable cover pages
If users have to fight the interface, they’ll find a workaround. Usually a bad one.
Integrations
For some customers, integrations matter more than bells and whistles:
EMR or EHR document workflows
Document management systems
CRM attachments and record logging
Fax that disappears into an inbox is fine. Fax that lands exactly where it belongs is better.
Billing that matches real usage
Fax is often usage-driven, not seat-driven.
Many MSPs prefer per-page or tiered usage models so pricing stays aligned with actual consumption. Flat-rate plans can look attractive until one heavy fax account eats your margin alive.
Viirtue has written extensively about why per-page fax-to-email billing works better for resellers, especially when you want predictable costs without punishing light users.
Web fax services for MSPs: the reseller angle
Web fax becomes much more interesting when it’s designed for resale.
For MSPs, the value compounds when:
The portal is branded under your company name
Fax shows up on the same invoice as voice and managed services
Provisioning and billing are automated instead of being manual
Viirtue positions Cloud Fax as a branded, billable service tied directly into its ViiBE quote-to-cash engine. Partners can choose fixed-rate or per-page billing and manage fax alongside the rest of their communications stack, without juggling systems or spreadsheets.
Fax may be old. Selling it doesn’t have to be.
