Business form handling method and system for carrying out the same

A method of handling business forms by reading contents set forth on processing-subjected business forms by an image reading device, recognizing the contents set forth on the business forms from an image as read and performing processing in accordance with the contents set forth on the business forms, comprising the steps of:

• reading business forms of plural species which differ from one another in respect to a field of the image to be cut;
• deciding discriminatively whether or not the read image is relevant to a business form of a first species by referencing form species identifying definition information stored previously in the file;
• cutting image from a field corresponding to a format inherent to said business form of the first species;
• recognizing the contents of the statement from the cut image;
• making decision discriminatively on the basis of result of the recognition of said contents as to whether said business form of the first species has subordinate attribute;
• and
• cutting an image from a field corresponding to a format inherent to said subordinate attribute to thereby recognize said contents from said cut image when said business form of the first species has said subordinate attribute,
• whereas when said read image is irrelevant to said business form of the first species,
• deciding discriminatively whether or not the read image is relevant to a business form of a second species by referencing the form species identifying definition information stored previously in the file;
• cutting an image from a field corresponding to a format inherent to said business form of the second species when said read image is relevant to said business form of the second species, to thereby recognize the contents of statement from said cut image,
• making decision discriminatively on the basis of result of the recognition of said contents as to whether said business form of the second species has subordinate attribute;
• cutting an image from a field corresponding to a format inherent to said subordinate attribute to thereby recognize the contents from said cut image when said business form of the second species has said subordinate attribute;
• and
• performing processing in accordance with result of the recognition.

A method of handling business forms by reading contents set forth on a processing-subjected business form by an image reading device, recognizing the contents set forth on the business form from an image as read and performing processing in accordance with the contents set forth on the business form, comprising the steps of:

• recognizing whether or not a processing-subjected business form is an identifier-affixed business form which is affixed with an identifier at a predetermined position among those of plural species;
• and
• cutting an image conforming to a format of said identifier-affixed business form when said processing-subjected business form is the identifier-affixed business form to thereby recognize contents of said cut image,
• whereas when said processing-subjected business form, is not the identifier-affixed business form,
• recognizing whether or not said processing-subjected business form is a barcode-affixed business form, and cutting an image conforming to a format of said barcode-affixed business form when said processing-subjected business form is the barcode-affixed business form, to thereby recognize contents of said cut image,
• while when said processing-subjected business form is not the barcode-affixed business form,
• recognizing whether or not the processing-subjected business form is an MICR business form having MICR (Magnetic Ink Character Recognition)-oriented characters recorded thereon;
• and
• cutting an image conforming to a format of said MICR business form when said processing-subjected business form is the MICR business form, to thereby recognize contents of said cut image;
• and
• unless said processing-subjected business form is recognized as any one of said identifier-affixed business forms, said barcode-affixed business form and said MICR business form,
• inputting identification information of said processing-subjected business form through an input unit;
• and
• cutting an image of a field conforming to a business-form format which corresponds to said identification information inputted, to thereby recognize the contents set forth from the cut image;
• and
• performing relevant jobs processing for said processing-subjected business form in accordance with result of the recognition validated for said processing-subjected business form.

A business form handling system for reading contents set forth on a processing-subjected business form by an image reading device, recognizing the contents set forth on the processing-subjected business form from an image as read, comprising:

• a business form definition information file in which definition information for identifying business forms of plural species is registered previously;
• a business form species identifying module for deciding discriminatively which of said plural species said processing-subjected business form belongs to through a processing for matching a read image of said processing-subjected business form read by said image reading device with said definition information;
• and
• a character recognition processing module for cutting an image of a field set previously as a subject for recognition in the business form definition information for said decided species, to thereby perform character recognition for an image set as a subject for a character recognition in said cut image.

An image processing apparatus, comprising:

• an input control unit for inputting an image of a processing-subjected business form to thereby perform a control for correcting skewness of said image;
• a business form identifying module for fetching business-form format definition information stored in a file designed for storing formats of business forms to compare said definition information with the image undergone the correction of skewness by said input control unit, for thereby identifying species of said business form;
• a recognition module for recognizing said image on the basis of result of the identification performed by said business form identifying module;
• and
• a display control unit for performing a control for displaying result of the recognition performed by said recognition module on an external display unit.