On Tuesday, 19 June 2018 10:58:36 UTC+1, Rod Speed wrote:
NY wrote
Rod Speed wrote
NY wrote

For B&W (eg letters) a laser is probably a better buy than an inkjet -
no streaky print if it's not been used for a while.

What is the point of printing letters anymore ?

For companies that need an "official", signed document.

Havent come across one of those in decades now.

Most solicitors requre such things to be physically signed on paper.
For some things such as house deeds signing over ownership they DO NOT accept emails or even fax.
Selfies of you signing it aren't accdepted either you still need a witness..


Makes more sense to print those down the library etc on the
very rare occasion where you come across one of those now.

Yes plenty of places can print for you now.



or which only provide a "Contact Us" web form: I find that an email

Which doesnt need anything printed.

or a written letter is harder to ignore and more likely to elicit a
response than a web form which I suspect often gets redirected to
/dev/null or else to a junior support sprog who tries to palm you off with
platitudes and who utterly fails to address the points you raise.

Written letters just get filed in the round filing cabinet under the desk..

Depending on the contents the written letter might be as it was with the windrush files and should have been scanned or photographed in some way and stored.


This will change over time, though the signed letter for financial
authorisation may take a long time to be dragged into the 21st century.

Phone calls worked fine for share trading even in the 60s.

doesn't mean they do now.


Even with buying houses etc, I didnt need
to print anything, the agent did that.

The agent charges for such things or it's included in the costs.



I have savings with one company who will accept a fax of a signed letter
in lieu of it being sent by post, but will not accept an emailed scan of
the same letter. Work that one out! They are both images of the same
written document, just sent via different technology.

Good reason to dump those dinosaurs.

faxes are more difficult to fake, I wouldn't dump them, I'd rather they are careful than just accepting anyhting as proof.
It's not like emails are dufficult to forge.


I did have a couple of banks a few decades ago that dinosaury,
but havent come across one that dinosaury for decades now.