| You said you were looking for information about your patent on our website. Our website
showed the patent as withdrawn but you felt this was incorrect and wanted to know the latest status
of your patent. |
We contacted you and explained that the patent did not proceed because the substantive examination
fee was not paid. You were send copies of our letters including one requesting the payment of the substantive
examination fee. |
| You suggested an improvement to the patent on-line filing system. When you received your
filing receipt it just stated “Covering Letter” and “Amended pages”, and you wondered whether it was
possible if the web pages were improved so that specific page numbers could be identified so that the
receipt would be able to prove which pages were filed on that date. |
We told you that previously the receipt did contain the file names but for security reasons
they were removed. We said that it was not possible to identify specific page numbers associated with
e-filings although we could provide a total of the pages filed. This change will be considered as part
of a review to be carried out later this year. |
| You asked about the cost of filing a patent direct with the IPO and filing it through an
agent. You also asked what rights the patent would give you and if the IPO would offer you any help
with your patent. |
We informed you the total cost for filing a UK patent was £200, however the costs were significantly
more than this if an agent was used but that was a decision that you would have to make. You were told
the UK patent only protected you in the UK and your invention could be sold in the USA without infringing
your UK patent. |
| You were unhappy because at the end of the patent online filing process, there was no Filing
Receipt. Instead there was a message that said "Your receipt will be emailed shortly". You
did not receive the filing receipt. |
We said that at the time you filed, there was a fault with the online filing system and
this was why the receipt was not sent immediately. The fault took a couple of days to fix. As soon as
the fault was fixed, the filing receipts were sent out. |
| You said the online patent system gives a warning - subsequently changed to "Correct"
- when the priority date is exactly one year ahead of the current date. This was confusing in that it was not clear whether this was a direction to correct something, or was
indicating that all was ok irrespective of the warning message. |
We told you that, the warning "Correct" was generated when the priority date was
exactly 12 months prior to the filing date. Although, the filing date was within the time
allowed, the "correction" link gave the option for you to return directly to the page where
the data was entered if amendment were required. The "correction"was
not mandatory, but gave the user the option to correct. We also told you that your comments had been
passed on to the project team working on the web filing system. |
| You wanted information about an International Application. Whether your application had
been entered into the UK (National Phase) or not? and whether this application had been granted into
the UK or not? |
We said that the PCT/EP did originally designate the UK however no entry was made into our
national phase. The application was eventually granted covering DE ES FR IT. |
| You were unhappy with the delay in searching your application. |
We explained that there was a large backlog of Form 9A searches and priority was being given
to ensure that these were done within 4 months. You were asked whether you had a reason for expediting
the application - you didn't. You said that you intended taking this up with the Patents Director. |
| You suggested that we introduced editable pdf forms on our website, as these were much easier
forms to fill in than using the Word templates. |
We told you that we did trials a few years ago on editable PDF versions of our official
forms and it raised a number of issues. Therefore the business areas decided to abandon editable PDFs
and go down the route of offering Word versions of the forms. |
| You wanted you name and address changed because you did not want it to be searchable on
Google and other search engines. |
We said that action was taken to amend the name and address shown on our website so that
your personal name and address would not be searchable on Google or similar search engines. |
| You said that we had an excellent website, making IP information readily available to all.
However, for the uninitiated, a fuller glossary of terms and abbreviations would be useful. |
We told you where to find the relevant information for these abbreviations and this feedback
was copied to the Internet Development Team. |
| You called to find out what was happening to your examination report. You said that you
had sent in two faxes requesting information about your exam report. |
We said that there were no faxes on your file. |
| You said that a copy of the letter issued to WIPO notifying of a partial ceasing of effect
was not sent to you. The partial ceasing of effect was in fact incorrect and you did not know about
the problem until you were notified by WIPO. |
We said that our practice written in the international desk instructions was to send a copy
of this letter to the agent but this was overlooked in this case. |
| You said that it was frustrating not being able to search for agents or ADP numbers on our
external website. |
We contacted you and told you that your feedback would be passed onto the Web site re-design
team and other relevant managers in the IPO to review. |
| You said that the office had incorrectly accepted a particular trade mark. |
We investigated this issue and explained that once the mark was registered the Office did
not have any power to take any action against registered trademarks. We told you about the trade mark
registration process and the need for the Office to remain impartial in these matters. You were also
given information about the invalidity process and the contact addresses for the Institute of Trade
Mark Attorneys, in case you wanted to pursue this matter. |
| You said that you wanted your home address details to be removed from Google and other search
engines. |
We told you that action was taken by the Register Maintenance Team to remove your address
details from Google and other search engines. |
| You said you received a renewal reminder for your trade mark and noticed that, it showed
that 2 other similar trade marks to your trade mark had been allowed to be registered. You had not been
told about these other trademarks and questioned how useful your trade mark registration was. |
We explained that these 2 trade marks were community trademarks and then gave a brief explanation
of the Community Trade Mark (CTM) System. We said that the Community Trade Mark Office did not have
to inform national trade mark holders of any similar trademarks that had been applied for. The onus
was on the holder of any earlier right to challenge the registration of any later filed Community Trade
Mark. You were advised to seek legal advice on this issue and were given the contact addresses of a
number of Trade Marks and
Patent Associations. |
| You said you were concerned that you could not enter more than one applicant on the TMD
e-filed application. You had joint ownership of two people and were unable to put both names on the form as there was no
alternative field to add a second owner of trade mark. |
We considered your suggestion that it would be better if the user had an alternative field
to add more than one owner. We told you that your suggestion would be passed onto the relevant work area to consider. |
| You said that you had received an invoice from a company called EIEC and did not know whether
it was from the IPO and whether or not you should pay the invoice. |
We told you about EIEC and the service they were offering and that they were nothing to
do with the IPO and that you did not have to pay the invoice if they did not want to. Following a brief
discussion you decided that you would not be taking up EIEC’s offer to put your trade mark
on a private register. |
| You said it would be helpful if someone could update the software so that it included your
reference in the body of the e-mail or preferably the subject field? With all the different e-mails
being generated it was starting to get a bit confusing if you've filed more than one application. |
We told you that your comments were passed onto the relevant work area. |
| You said that you did not know why a Section 3 objection had been raised against your mark.
You had been told that your mark was totally descriptive of the services and that under the Trade Marks
Act these types of marks would not be registerable. You understood, but commented that this information
wasn't
clearly stated on our website, which you had consulted before filing the application. |
An I.T. manager checked the website and said that this improvement would be introduced
on the new website. |
| You said that you had recently received a trade mark caveat letter and wondered if it might
be possible to include the date of the Journal publication, as well as its number. As this would save you time in reporting to your Client and noting deadlines on our system and would
be very useful. |
We responded and said we agree that this change would be helpful and would not be a lot
of work for the development team. We are in the process of writing a Change Proposal to get it costed and implemented. |
| Hundreds of you have contacted the IPO about a company called European Communities Trademark
Filing Service (ECTFS). This company is sending official looking invoices to customers asking for £573
to prepare an application for a European Communities Trademark. The small print states that
by paying the invoice
that you are instructing ECTFS to lodge a European Communities Trademark application using your UK proposed
or registered mark as a basis to file with OHIM. |
We have contacted you to explain exactly what these invoices are about. The issue has also
been raised with TMD managers and they are going to find out the scale of the problem and meet to agree
a common approach to deal with enquiries relating to this company. A warning paragraph has been inserted
in all the paper and electronic receipts issued by the IPO warning customers about ECTFS. |
