Statutory guidance

Guidance notes on changes to patents, trade marks and designs forms made as a result of the additional payment sheet to fee bearing forms

Published 30 September 2020

(a) These notes are not part of the Directions. They are intended to provide background and additional information.

(b) The Interpretation Act 1978 applies to these Directions. Therefore, all the definitions set out in the Registered Designs Act 1949 (as amended), Patents Act 1977 (as amended) and the Trade Marks Act 1994 (as amended) apply to these Directions. Further, amongst other things, generally any words importing the masculine gender include the feminine and words in the singular include the plural and words in the plural include the singular.

(c) Section 31A of the Registered Design Act, Section 123(2A) of the Patents Act and Section 66 of the Trade Marks Act allows the comptroller to give directions specifying any forms the use of which is required by the Designs Rules, the Patents Rules and the Trade Mark Rules.

(d) The following design forms, patents forms and trade mark forms have been revised as set out below.

Trade Marks Form 3, Trade Marks Form 3A, Trade Marks Form 5, Trade Marks Form 7, Trade Marks Form 7F, Trade Marks Form 7G, Trade Marks Form 11, Trade Marks Form 12, Trade Marks Form 13, Trade Marks Form 16, Trade Marks Form 16P, Trade Marks Form 24, Trade Marks Form 24C, Trade Marks Form 26(I), Trade Marks Form 26(N), Trade Marks Form 26(O), Trade Marks Form 31C, Trade Marks Form 31M, Trade Marks Form 31R, Trade Marks Form 35, Trade Marks Form 36, Trade Marks Form 50, Trade Marks Form 51, Trade Marks Form 55P, Patents Form AF1, Patents Form 1, Patents Form 2, Patents Form 3, Patents Form 4, Patents Form 9A, Patents Form 10, Patents Form 12, Patents Form 15, Patents Form 17, Patents Form 21, Patents Form 23, Patents Form 34, Patents Form 49, Patents Form NP1, Patents Form SP1, Patents Form SP2, Patents Form SP3, Patents Form SP4, Designs Form 2A, Designs Form 2B, Designs Form 2C, Designs Form 9A, Designs Form 19A, Designs Form 21, Designs Form 23, Designs Right Form 1, Designs Right Form 2, Designs Right Form 3, Designs Right Form 4

(e) These forms have been revised to add a payment sheet as the final sheet of each form. To achieve this, a blank page has been inserted on forms with an odd number of pages. Customers must provide a separate payment for each form they file. They must also indicate the fee amount being paid and provide contact details on the form.

(f) If paying by debit or credit card they must pay online and insert the reference they receive on the form. If paying by deposit account, they must enter the account number on the form. The new forms also allow customers to pay by cheque or to enter their account details for payment bank transfer.

(g) Fee bearing forms will not be processed if payment details are not provided.

Patents form 1 and patents form 3

(h) Further to paragraph (g) these forms will be processed without a fee in accordance with legal provisions.

Patents forms 9A and 10

(i) The payment section of Patents Form 9A has been altered to reflect that additional fees for excess claims need to be paid and that the application fee can be paid with the form. Similarly, the payment section of patents form 10 has been altered to reflect that additional fees for excess pages may be required.

Trade marks form 31C, 31M and 31R

(j) Trade Marks forms 31C, 31M and 31R have been altered to specify that the customer can only quote one trade mark number per form.

(k) All of the UK design forms, UK patents forms and UK trade mark forms (and information about associated fees) are available from our website.

(l) Any queries about these Directions should be addressed to:

Legal Section
Intellectual Property Office
Concept House
Cardiff Road
Newport
South Wales
NP10 8QQ
United Kingdom

Tel: +44(0)16 3381 1154