Send Faxes via Email Using Outlook

My Homemade Email Fax Service

This is a project I was thinking about for a while. I have a great service called Callwave that lets me receive faxes via email, but I cannot send faxes. I looked into several services like eFax, but they were all more expensive than I was willing to pay. I rarely send faxes. I could send faxes from home, but sometimes I needed to fax from work or at Starbucks or something.

I wanted to be able to email a file to my home computer and have it send it as a fax automatically. So, I did this project one afternoon.

Note: This code allows you to set up an unattended computer to fax email attachments it receives. The script automates keystrokes on the computer in order to send the fax. Therefore, it won’t work well if you or someone else is currently using the computer when the script runs. So, send the email from a different computer than the one set up to send faxes.

System Requirements

• Outlook XP or 2003 (it might work on other versions too, but not Outlook Express)
• A computer with a modem connected to a phone line (for faxing) and an always-on connection to the internet (ex. DSL or Cable)
• Windows fax services must be installed on the computer.

Set-up Instructions

1. Configure Outlook to automatically check for email every 5 minutes.
2. Create a script in Outlook that prints the attachment to the fax printer and runs the fax wizard.
   (Script Source Code below)
3. Set up a rule in Outlook to run the script whenever I receive an email with the word FAX in the subject.
   
   
4. Set the “Fax” printer as your default printer.
   
   

 Sending a Fax via Email

1. Create an email message and type “FAX” and then the recipient’s phone numbering the subject line. (Ex. FAX 2145551212)
   Don’t use spaces in the phone number and make sure it’s the last thing in the subject line.
2. Attach a document to the email.
3. Send the email.
   If you have set up the recipient computer correctly, it should receive the email and fax the attachment to the number in the subject line.

Outlook Script Code

Here is the code for the outlook script. A couple things to note:

• The first statement just allows you to use a windows function that’s not available in the Outlook VBA language. It must appear before the CustomMailMessage subroutine as shown below
• You must create a folder called C:\faxtemp or else the macro will fail.
• This script only faxes the first attachment. So, you’ll have to send each file you want to fax as a separate email.
• Feel free to use and modify this code as you like. Please email me if you find it useful.
• This code is provided as is, with no warranty expressed or implied.

Private Declare Function ShellExecuteA Lib "Shell32" (ByVal hwnd As Integer, ByVal lpOperation As String, ByVal lpFile As String, lpParameters As String, ByVal lpDirectory As String, ByVal nShowCmd As Integer) As Integer
 
 
Sub CustomMailMessageRule(Item As Outlook.MailItem)
 
    '******** Written 07/28/2005 
    '******** This Outlook script will fax an email attachment to the phone # in the subject line
    '******** This code is provided As-Is with no warranty expressed or implied.
 
    If Item.Attachments.Count = 0 Then Exit Sub     ' stop if there are no attachments
    Dim sPath As String
 
    sPath = "C:\faxtemp\" + Item.Attachments.Item(1).FileName
    Item.Attachments.Item(1).SaveAsFile (sPath)     'save attachment to C:\faxtemp
    Dim RetVal
    RetVal = ShellExecuteA(0, "print", """" + sPath + """", vbNullString, vbNullString, 0)
 
    '******** Wait for 10 seconds so the Fax Wizard dialog has time to appear ********'
 
    PauseTime = 10                                  ' Set duration.
    Start = Timer                                   ' Set start time.
    Do While Timer < Start + PauseTime
        DoEvents                                    ' Yield to other processes.
    Loop
    Finish = Timer
 
    SendKeys "{ENTER}", True                        'Press ENTER to go to next screen on Fax Wizard
 
    PauseTime = 2
    Start = Timer
    Do While Timer < Start + PauseTime
       DoEvents
    Loop
    Finish = Timer
 
   SendKeys Right$(Item.Subject, 10), True          'Enter last 10 characters of subject as recipient
   SendKeys "{TAB}" & "{TAB}", True                 'Press TAB to skip to the correct box on dialog
   SendKeys Right$(Item.Subject, 10), True          'Enter last 10 characters of subject as phone
 
   PauseTime = 1
   Start = Timer
   Do While Timer < Start + PauseTime
       DoEvents
   Loop
   Finish = Timer
 
   SendKeys "{ENTER}", True                         'Press ENTER to go to next screen
    PauseTime = 1
    Start = Timer
    Do While Timer < Start + PauseTime
       DoEvents
    Loop
    Finish = Timer
 
   SendKeys "{ENTER}", True                         'Press ENTER to go to next screen
    PauseTime = 1
    Start = Timer
    Do While Timer < Start + PauseTime
       DoEvents
    Loop
    Finish = Timer
 
   SendKeys "{ENTER}", True                         'Press ENTER to go to next screen
    PauseTime = 1
    Start = Timer
    Do While Timer < Start + PauseTime
       DoEvents
    Loop
    Finish = Timer
 
   SendKeys "{ENTER}", True                         'Press ENTER to Finish
 
 
End Sub 

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