Last updated · Written for practice managers and office administrators.
What happens when someone faxes you
- The call. The sending machine dials your number. Because the number has been ported to our carrier, the call terminates on fax servers instead of a machine in your office. The two sides negotiate, the pages are transmitted, and the sending machine gets its confirmation exactly as it would from a machine.
- The PDF. The received pages are converted to a PDF and stored encrypted at rest (AES-256) in US data storage. The record — sender number, time, page count, status — is written to your fax history.
- The notification. An email goes to your primary notification address and up to two additional addresses, and a push notification to the mobile app if you use it. The email contains a link, not the fax.
- Reading it. Click through, sign in (two-factor if you have turned it on), and the PDF opens in the inbox. Document links are time-limited. Download it, forward it inside the account, or leave it.
Why the fax is not attached to the email
Most people expect the PDF in the email. We do not do that, and it is a deliberate design choice rather than a limitation. An attachment in email is a copy of the document that leaves the encrypted store, lands in one or more mailboxes we do not control, is retained under someone else’s policy, and can be forwarded without any record. For an office that receives referrals, records requests or anything else sensitive, that is the weakest link in the chain.
Keeping the document behind sign-in means every access is authenticated, every view and download appears in the audit log, and the retention you set in Settings actually governs where the document exists. Our Privacy Policy describes the measures: TLS 1.2 or higher in transit, AES-256 at rest, time-limited document links, optional two-factor authentication, a 12-hour session limit with a 30-minute idle timeout, and a logged, least-privilege access model for our staff.
Notification settings
| Setting | What it does |
|---|---|
| Fax Received | Email when a new fax arrives on any of your numbers. |
| Delivery Confirmation | Email when a fax you sent is confirmed delivered. |
| Delivery Failure | Email when a fax you sent could not be delivered, with the reason. |
| Primary email | Where notifications go by default. |
| Additional emails | Up to two more addresses — a shared front-desk mailbox, a records clerk. |
| Push notifications | From the mobile app, at the same moment as the email. |
Storage and retention
Two settings in Settings → Storage control how long things exist. File retention applies to uploads and fax documents: 7, 30, 60 or 90 days, or unlimited. When a document reaches the end of its period it is deleted from our servers. Fax history — the record of each fax without the document — is kept 12 months after the fax completes by default, and the account owner or an admin can choose 24, 36 or 72 months. A history record is never deleted while its document is still kept, so the two settings cannot contradict each other.
Individual faxes can be deleted at any time. Deleting the account releases its numbers and removes its data as described in the Privacy Policy; audit entries survive with personal identifiers overwritten.
Team inbox and roles
On Solo one person works the inbox. Practice includes three users and Multi-site ten; extra seats are $8 per user per month on either. The account owner invites people by email (links expire after 14 days) and assigns a role: admins can manage members, numbers and porting, API keys, retention settings and the audit log; other roles can send and receive, or send only. Billing, signing the HIPAA BAA when it launches, and deleting the account stay with the owner.
Everyone signs in with their own credentials, so the audit log — sign-ins, fax sent, viewed, downloaded or deleted, settings and team changes — names the person, the time and the browser. Owners and admins can view and export it. Audit records are retained for a minimum of six years.
Getting the right fax to the right person
With one number and several people, the practical questions are who sees what and who is responsible for it. Three patterns work: a shared front-desk address as an additional notification email with a named person triaging the inbox; separate numbers per department on Multi-site (three included); or simply relying on roles, where every member sees the inbox and the audit log shows who handled each fax. Whichever you choose, the number your correspondents dial does not change — which is the point of keeping it.