To copy out and transmit an original including the image data of handwritten characters and photos, etc.

This facsimile equipment is provided with an image scanner 7 for reading the contents of an original paper sheet written based on a predetermined form and converting them to the image data, a data processing part 1 for separately extracting an area where the handwritten characters are written and the area where something other than the characters is written from the image data and a character recognition part 3 for recognizing the characters written in the area based on the image data of a handwritten character area extracted by the data processing part 1. By replacing the handwritten character area of the image data with the character data of a fair copy based on the characters recognized in the character recognition part 3, the image data are reconstructed and transmitted.