What belongs on a fax cover sheet — and what must not
Six lines: who it is for, who it is from, how to reach you, the date, the page count, and one line of subject. Never the contents.
A cover sheet exists for one reason: a fax arrives in a shared tray, and somebody who is not the recipient will pick it up first. Everything on the page should help that person route it, and nothing on it should tell them anything they have no business knowing.
The six lines that matter
- To — a person or a department, and the organisation. 'Accounts' is fine; 'Whom it may concern' is a page that gets left on the machine.
- From — your name and organisation, spelled the way you want it read back to you on the phone.
- A number to reach you on. Not just the fax number: a voice line or an email. Half the reason a fax goes unanswered is that nobody could ask a question about it.
- Date and time, because the receiving machine's own clock is wrong more often than not.
- Page count, including the cover. This is how the recipient knows whether a partial transmission cost them anything — see what a transmission report proves.
- One line of subject. 'Referral, appointment 14 March' — enough to route it, not enough to read it.
What must not be on it
The cover sheet is the page most likely to be seen by the wrong person, so it is the page that must carry the least. Keep off it:
- Any of the content. No diagnosis, no account balance, no case detail. A subject line that summarises the document defeats the point of the document being behind a cover.
- Full identifiers. Not a full date of birth, national insurance number, patient number or account number. If the recipient needs one to match the fax to a file, a partial — last four digits — does the job.
- A confidentiality notice longer than two sentences. The long ones are not read, and they push the useful lines onto a second page.
Cover sheets are pages
Every plan counts a cover sheet as a page, both against your allowance and against the per-fax page limit. On a two-page document it is a third of the fax. Skip it when you are faxing a person who is expecting you.
When to skip it entirely
If the recipient knows the fax is coming and it goes to their own machine, the cover sheet is a page of ceremony. Where it earns its place is the opposite case: an organisation, a shared line, and nobody expecting you.
The header line is not the cover sheet
Separately from anything you write, the receiving machine stamps a line across the top of every page: the sending number, the time, and a page counter. You cannot remove it, and it is why a document with content in the top 10mm arrives with that content struck through. Leave the margin — what a fax does to a PDF covers the rest of the geometry.