Hello and welcome to today’s Webinar, “Maximize Your MFPs (or multifuction printers) With Cloud Faxing – Is Your Business Ready? Part 2.”
This is the second part of two-part series. If you joined us for Part 1, thank you again. If you were not able to attend the previous webinar, as we mentioned on the registration page you’ll receive a link to watch Part I on demand.
I’m Michael Flavin, Sr. Product Manager with eFax Corporate®. Our Brad Spannbauer could not be here today, but we are privileged to be joined by Peter Ely, Leader, Channels, Enterprise Marketing, also part of j2 Global®. Thanks for joining Peter!
For our agenda today, we’ll answer the questions, How does eFax Corporate® integrate with the MFP, and how to get it?
Next we’ll discuss what these features can do for your organization – in creating a single, integrated system for all of your document transmissions
We’ll also discuss how integration of your MFPs with eFax Corporate® can create streamlined and efficient workflows and eliminate unnecessary fax infrastructure
Then we’ll review some Use Cases with businesses== segments that rely heavily on fax as part of their business, such as legal and insurance
We’ll then discuss how integrating your fax processes with eFax Corporate® can enhance compliance
And finally, we’ll review why eFax Corporate® is a solid candidate for outsourcing to the cloud
We’ll conclude with a Q&A, where we turn the discussion over to your questions.
As we discussed in Part 1 of this webinar series, Multifunction Printers (MFPs) are a great way to increase productivity and improve workflow from an existing asset. Because most IT organizations aren’t fully maximizing their MFPs, we see these improvements as low-hanging fruit – because these features can be deployed quickly and cost-effectively, without adding any additional hardware.
We discussed in Part 1 the many reasons that fax is still a necessary business technology, and will be for years to come.
But I wanted to give a quick, 1-minute review of those reasons — because there’s a common misconception in business that fax is on its way out. Briefly, here’s why businesses still need fax capability…
There are business needs. For example, what if delivery requires a confirmation receipt?
There are compliance needs. What if communication modes your business is using, such as email, are not in alignment or puts your business at risk with industry privacy regulations such as HIPAA, GLBA?
There’s often the need for document traceability. What if you need a clear and complete audit trail of every transmission?
And there are often market demands. What if your customers or partners demand a fax, or need to send one to your organization?
And finally…
There are Security Requirements. What if your document contains sensitive data and needs additional layers of security only a secure fax can provide?
17 million MFPs were sold in 2014, according to a report from research firm IDC. By the way, these MFP makers shown here represented the top 5 brands for 2014.
Okay, so let’s get into the specifics of eFax Corporate’s MFP Fax Direct feature, and how it can help you improve employee workflows, boost staff productivity — and, perhaps just as important, relieve you of some of the IT headaches associated with your current faxing process.
We’ll get into some specifics of how eFax Corporate®’s MFP feature can help you optimize workflows and increase the ROI from your existing MFPs, but for now… just a quick overview.
Our MFP faxing feature essentially lets your staff fax right from the “glass” of your existing MFPs.
It’s simple. You place a paper fax onto your printer and use the printer’s control panel to send it. eFax Corporate® converts the fax to an electronic file — PDF, TIFF or other format — and sends it to your recipient’s fax number, where it appears as a standard fax.
eFax Corporate® logs all relevant details of this transmission, emails you a delivery confirmation, and you then have the option to securely store the digital fax itself and the usage log in your eFax Corporate® cloud, so your organization has access to it anytime for auditing or compliance purposes.
And in case you’re wondering just how simple it can be to eliminate your fax machines, fax servers, telco lines and all of the IT hassles that go with them, here’s a visual explanation of what happens when you use eFax Corporate® with your MFP.
You go from this… a complicated IT network of in-house managed fax machines and fax servers…
To this… a fully hosted cloud fax model where all management and upkeep of your fax infrastructure is outsourced to a team of professionals.
It’s easy to integrate your MFPs into your eFax Corporate® cloud faxing service — and eliminate your legacy fax hardware.
In essence: creating a single, integrated system for all of your fax and document transmissions, while eliminating significant IT overhead and pain points of maintenance, support, fax machines, fax server, telephone lines – things that can bog a business down.
So, the question we get from a lot of IT managers, CIOs, or business owners: how much work is the integration or migration to cloud faxing and faxing from your MFP?
Well - here’s how fast and easy it is to extend the capabilities of your MFPs to include cloud faxing.
So, the question we get from a lot of IT managers, CIOs, or business owners: how much work is the integration or migration to cloud faxing and the MFP Fax Direct Feature?
Well - here’s how fast and easy it is to extend the capabilities of your MFPs to include cloud faxing.
STEP 1: Set up eFax Corporate cloud fax account.
STEP 2: Make sure your office MFP is Internet-connected or ready.
STEP 3: Make sure your MFP can send or receive email, either with its own email address or using an external address.
And that’s it! As soon as you set up your eFax Corporate® account, your staff can start sending paper faxes right from your MFPs.
What a lot of companies we talk to didn’t realize is that moving to a cloud fax model enables faxing from ANY end point – as long as it has internet connectivity and you’ve setup an account, you can send and receive faxes electronically as emails. Training is easy because if users can send email they can send a fax and again, when sending those wet ink signatures or business requires paper fax, send from their MFP.
Let’s review the standard scenarios for integrating cloud fax capability with an organization’s existing MFPs. You can use this walkthrough to find the scenario most appropriate to your company’s needs and circumstances.
Our first scenario, this is typical of the setup in a small office, say a small legal practice or real estate office where a desktop or consumer type MFP is being used, often shared by the office. In most cases, the MFP has an email address assigned to it by the manufacturer, with emails routed through a cloud email service managed by the vendor. Usually messages sent to the MFP’s email address will be printed automatically.
To set up the integration, just add the MFP’s email address as both a Send and Receive Address on one of the office eFax user accounts. Once added to an account, faxes sent to the user’s fax number will be emailed to the printer and will print automatically. When sending, use the “scan to email” function to generate an email message, then address the outgoing email as normal when using eFax: [email protected]
This is easy to set up, easy to use, and has almost no administrative overhead – you’re just using an existing account. Because it’s all tied to one account, though, you lose reporting on individual usage and have only a minimal audit trail. Using the vendor’s email server limits your security options – TLS encryption may not be supported.
The second scenario involves the use of a larger MFD, usually one of many located within a larger office or across an enterprise. These devices are often integrated more tightly into the organization’s network. In most cases, these MFDs will have an email address assigned by the network admin and will leverage the organization’s email infrastructure. The device may also have access to network shares for storing files. Messages sent *to* the MFD’s email address can be printed automatically or written to a storage directory. The MFD is not configured to require individual user authentication – anyone in the office can walk up and scan, copy, or print.
To set up the integration, create an eFax user account for the device, using its email address for sending and receiving. Faxes sent to the MFD’s fax number will be emailed to the printer for automatic printing or storage to a SAN for example. When sending, use the “scan to email” function on the MFD, then address the outgoing email as normal when using eFax: [email protected]
This configuration is easy to set up and easy to maintain, and allows any employee in the office to send a fax without having an eFax account. You can assign a custom cover page to each printer account. And by using your email server, you can implement tighter security protocols like TLS encryption.
However, like the desktop solution, this configuration doesn’t provide delivery confirmation receipts to individual senders, nor does it offer granular reporting or usage tracking.
In the third scenario, the MFD has an even tighter integration into the organization’s network. In addition to an email address on the organization’s email server, the MFD will also be tied to the Active Directory or LDAP server for user authentication. The MFD is then configured to require individual user authentication – users in the office must log in on the device before they can scan, copy, or print.
To set up the integration, create an eFax user account for every person in the office who’ll be using fax services. Faxes sent to the users’ fax numbers will be emailed to each user for viewing.
When sending, users log in to the MFD and use the “scan to email” function on the MFD, then address the outgoing email as normal when using eFax: [email protected] Unlike the previous scenarios, the emails appear to come from the user themselves, not from the printer, and are thus tied to each individual’s eFax account.
Since individual users are identified, this scenario allows for the greatest degree of reporting and tracking accuracy, and it provides a very clear audit trail. Each user receives their own delivery confirmation receipt and can have their own custom cover page.
The gains in reporting come at the expense of administrative overhead – for this configuration to work, every user in the organization must have their own properly configured eFax account.
Our final scenario is designed for organizations that want to allow any user to send a fax with detailed usage tracking and delivery confirmations, but without the requirement of an eFax account for each user. (e.g. AD or LDAP).
To set this up, create an eFax account for each MFP in the organization, making sure to use the device’s email address. To send a fax, use the scan to email function, but instead of the standard address – [email protected] – your users will include additional parameters in the recipient address. These parameters allow users to specify their OWN email address for the delivery confirmation (they can enter their own email address), select a custom cover page, or supply a client matter or departmental billing code.
This is a great use case for employees who do a lot of faxing because many MFPs allow for programmable hot keys – or programming this SMTP info into memory as a memorized address – more about that in a moment.
So, after faxing, the delivery confirmation is emailed directly to the sender, while the email address and billing code are stored in the usage logs, allowing granular reporting, usage tracking, and an enhanced audit trail. With this feature, we’ve reduced the administrative overhead, while giving every user in the organization a customizable fax solution.
Now let’s walk through some use cases.
First, we’ll apply some actual use cases and delve a bit more deeply into the ‘how’ of configuring an MFP to integrate with the eFax® Corporate. We will use the enterprise example Michael mentioned , giving you overview of how to configure your MFP so that your users can fax directly from the MFP glass AND can also take advantage of customizing options – things like custom cover pages, return receipts, client matter or billing codes, amongst others.
Next we’ll review two specific examples - how businesses in the legal and insurance industries have used this feature to solve some of the business workflow inefficiencies associated with fax.
As mentioned, integrating your fax process with cloud faxing through eFax Corporate® is a great way to simplify your business workflow — creating a one-step process — by faxing directly from the MFP glass.
For example, in healthcare – the need to send ePHI to pharmacies or insurance companies for further action. This must include ePHI disclosure page (cover sheet). The MFP configuration can be setup so this is done with a single push of a button process (set up by a Sys Admin), and includes a custom cover page and Confirmation receipt automatically — a step that’s critical for HIPAA compliance and great for audit trails — and better patient care.
Let’s walk through a sample configuration given Michael’s example.
As discussed earlier, you’ll first need to setup an eFax® account; have an MFP that’s network-ready, and use the existing email of the device – or assign an email to it. With your eFax Corporate® account, from your Admin Portal simply setup this printer as a ‘user’. If needed, our great support staff can help you with this setup for all of your organizations' devices.
This is also where you can upload custom cover pages for use from the MFPs with the one time help of the administrator.
Note: mandatory fields are the + sign
Admin must set the users and the MFP.
In the Enterprise integration scenario, using the Enterprise Integration, anyone can walk up and send a fax. It just depends on what’s best for your organization.
For number s that will be sent to frequently, you’ll want to enter this info into the MFP user interface. This is an example screen – other MFPs will have a different UI or flow, but your IT support or administrators can add this in for your organization.
In this case, you’re leveraging the MFPs ‘fax to email’ functionality.
Once the fax number is added to the MFP’s address book and shown as “hot buttons” on the printer control panel any user can walk up and send a fax directly from the glass. As shown in the entry in green, this address entry can include the triggers for including a custom cover page and return receipt address — so it only has to be entered once as you initially configure the MFP.
In this scenario, the administrator programmed in the fax [email protected] send, also added in a custom cover page called ‘WGCP1’ (which stands for work group copier 1) , and the return address [email protected]
So this user is setup to send this from the address book of the MFP – faxing directly to the cloud with the touch of a button.
Now let’s consider how some typical organizations in the business world are using the MFP Fax Direct feature.
By example, we work with half of the law firms in “The American Lawyer (ALM’s) top 100, who rely heavily on our portfolio to send faxes worldwide.
This particular customer uses eFax Corporate® with optional TLS encryption enabled to send documents on behalf of their clients to the courts.
Let’s drill down a little bit….
One of our top 100 law-firm customers has 19 locations, and wanted to solve for automation of the process so that administrative assistants or paralegals could send documents to the same court with a touch of a button, accompanied by a custom cover page, a confirmation receipt (to ensure timely filings of appeals) and done so in a highly secure manner to protect client confidentiality.
In this case, the firm programmed in what you see in the green
- cn=cover page name (District Court #9 Appeals) which toggles ‘on’ cover page (cp) automatically.
And
2) ra=john :admin to trigger the return address confirmation receipt
With this, once the firm has scanned in and sent the fax document via MFP, the audit trail will be easily traceable along with the confirmation receipt – a critical piece to law practice operations. Administrators have the option to copy the return receipt to a share folder or storage area network for future retrieval as well.
In the insurance industry, many of our clients rely heavily on faxing for authorizations, medical claims or transmission of other protected health information. This involves the critical elements of security, compliance and confirmation/audit trails.
In this example we’re looking at one of our insurance clients that uses fax to send authorizations to their associated Providers for surgeries.
This particular insurance firm sends ePHI – known as electronic protected health information and protected under HIPAA - to a given surgery center, multiple times each day.
Their goal was to automate this process and enhance security, as their original mode of communications may not have been aligned with HIPAA.
Typical examples of misalignments, not for this Client but in general are faxes without specific PHI disclosures on the cover page, or faxes lying in the open exposed to PHI breach
These both may trigger reportable events under HIPAA.
Requirements
THE GOAL:
Automate the process of sending signed hardcopy authorizations to surgery center each day — ideally with “the touch of a button.”
THE REQUIREMENTS:
Each fax will contain patient PHI
Each fax will contain ePHI disclosure
Each fax needs a custom cover page
Transmission must be encrypted — per HIPAA!
THE SOLUTION:
Using eFax Corporate, and with the optional TLS configured, the Insurance Administrator is able to send many fax authorizations to the surgery center every day by simply dropping them on the MFP, scanning them, and then utilizing the memorized MFP fax address configured to do this – a great time saver which also helps enhance compliance.
Here, a custom cover page was generated, disclosing the ePHI that’s being transmitted to the receiver; a confirmation receipt is set to be sent to the sender, and a copy is also sent to the secure folder on their exchange server, managed by their systems administrator.
In summary – businesses and enterprises can enjoy the benefit of a single, integrated system for all fax documents…
…with the added perk of eliminating unneeded and dated fax infrastructure – commonly a pain point for IT staff or business owners.
We also discussed how new customers and existing clients are pleased to get more use out of their existing MFP investments, while improving workflows and compliance!
All by moving to a cloud fax solution with eFax Corporate.
Now I’ll hand it back over to Michael to wrap up.
Businesses in virtually every industry, particularly those that need to send highly sensitive material by fax or that are heavily regulated by data privacy laws, choose eFax Corporate® as their Secure Compliant Online Fax Solution. They do so for the following reasons:
Compliance and audit capabilities.
Scalability of their fax infrastructure — up or down, as often as they need.
Redundancy and disaster recovery.
Volume requirements.
Security protocols.
Another key differentiator: Faxing is our core business. eFax Corporate has a geographically dispersed, global network with Tier III and Tier IV colocations, providing a 99.5% uptime, rapid delivery times and unparalleled transmission security.
Now let’s turn the discussion over to you and answer your questions.