Design protection in Europe

Registering your design in the United Kingdom (UK) does not protect it elsewhere in the European Union (EU).

To protect your design throughout the EC, you can apply for a Registered Community Design (RCD) at the Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market (OHIM). Application details are available on their website. To get protection in individual EC countries, you must make a separate application to each country.

If you are applying for a Registered Community Design within 6 months of making the same application in the UK, you can claim a 'priority date', which will be the same as your UK filing date. This means that if you are involved in an invalidation or infringement dispute, your priority date will be taken into account.

Your design may also have some automatic protection in the EU through Community Unregistered Design Right and copyright laws in individual Member States.

Your European application will cover all Member States of the EU

These countries are:

Austria, Bulgaria, Belgium, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia , Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, United Kingdom.

An up-to-date list can be found on the Europa website .

How long will the registration last?

Registered Community Designs are protected for a period of five years. They can be then renewed four times giving a maximum life of 25 years protection.

Using us to file your application

You can file your application for a Registered Community Design with us, or you can file it directly with OHIM in Alicante, Spain.

The advantage of using us is that you will receive an earlier filing date (the day on which we receive your application form) and a filing receipt.

We charge a handling fee of GBP £15.The fee should be sent accompanied by our fee sheet FS3.

The rest of the application fees are payable in Euros and they should be paid directly to OHIM. A list of current fees is available on the OHIM website .

Please note: we only offer a handling service and cannot advise on the requirements for registration of a Community Design.