Remote printing for the mobile professional

I frequently find myself in situations where I need to print a document, but either the client doesn’t have a printer, I’m in a hotel without my printer, or the security is such on the network that I can’t use their printer. What is a mobile guy to do?

I’m sure many of you have solutions that have worked for you, but here are two that I’ve used and my clients have used:

www.eFax.com and www.printanywhere.com

www.eFax.com lets you receive faxes directly to your email box, as well as send faxes. So when you need to print a document, you can fax it to your clients fax machine instead. In the event, someone needs to fax a hardcopy document for you to sign, they can fax it to your eFax number, you receive in your email, print it as a pdf (built-in), sign it using your tablet pc and PDF Annotator, then fax it back to them. They have a free service that lets you receive faxes only. To send and  receive faxes ( which you need for remote printing to a fax machine), pricing is $12.95 a month. I like this service because it allows me to have a fax machine wherever I go and handle remote printing needs at the same time.

www.printanywhere.com lets you print email attachments by sending them to a fax machine via the printanywhere.com webservice. You can use your tablet pc, laptop, or pda enabled phone. All you do is forward the email to [email protected] . This is a great service if all you have is your smart phone and need to print an attachment that someone just emailed you. I have not used this service myself, but several of my clients love it. Pricing starts at $4.95 per month.

What do you use to handle your remote printing needs?