US Patent 7787155 Communications device and communications method

In a communications device, a terminal machine transmits/receives data over a network and makes a request for a response to a data transmission from a receiving-end machine. In the terminal machine, an e-mail message identifying unit determines whether data to be received over the network is response data to the response request, and a main control unit controls so as to preferentially receive data identified as the response data by the e-mail message identifying unit over other data. Thus, if an e-mail message is transmitted with a request for a disposition verification, a reply message to the disposition verification request can be quickly received from the receiving-end machine.