Let's backup a moment. Is immediate transmission needed? The 21st century way is to queue the data and send when the Internet comes back online.
Like a mobile app ought to, you mean? ;-)
In this case there's a customer at the counter and everybody needs to know whether an insurer is going to cover any of the cost. The modem is a fall-back option in case the internet is down. I know this sort of question is neatly sidestepped in the whole Azure/Cloud etc theorizing, but to this day sometimes a donkey is better than an automobile.
"... They ne'er cared for us
yet: suffer us to famish, and their store-houses
crammed with grain; make edicts for usury, to
support usurers; repeal daily any wholesome act
established against the rich, and provide more
piercing statutes daily, to chain up and restrain
the poor. If the wars eat us not up, they will; and
there's all the love they bear us."
-- Shakespeare: Coriolanus, Act 1, scene 1
