The other day I sent a Section 71 document (a ten-year trademark renewal document) by means of the TEAS system to a foreign client for e-signature. The next day the TEAS system reported that the document had been e-signed. All that remained was for me to pay the $100 government fee. I figured this would be easy. I figured wrong. The Financial Manager system made it very difficult. The Financial Manager system locked my account and it was a lot of trouble getting things working again. Here are the details: Continue reading “Bad experience with Financial Manager”
Photos and video from the Sixth Annual E-Trademarks listserv reception
The Sixth Annual E-Trademarks Listserv reception took place on May 24, 2016 at B B King’s Blues Club in Orlando at the time of the INTA annual meeting.
To see photos and video from the reception, click here. If you enjoyed yourself at the reception, please post a comment below.
Comments are in on proposed TTAB rules
June 3 was the last date on which a would-be commenter could comment upon the TTAB’s proposed rules published April 4, 2016. I am pleased to be able to report that the E-Trademarks Listserv (ETL) was among the commenters. Other commenters included “the big four”, that is, IPO, ABA-IPL, INTA, and AIPLA. You can see all sixteen comments here. The ETL comments focused on three issues:
- whether it is a good idea for the TTAB to once again resume responsibility for carrying out service of process (a responsibility that had been shifted to the plaintiff in 2007);
- TTAB’s proposed requirement that the plaintiff figure out what email address the TTAB should use when carrying out service of process via email; and
- TTAB’s proposed limiting the number of Requests to Admit to 75.
I’ll summarize the positions taken by the various commenters on these three issues. Continue reading “Comments are in on proposed TTAB rules”
The background music in the Nashville airport
A couple of weeks ago I had the honor of teaching a class at the annual meeting of the Tennessee Intellectual Property Law Association. It was a delightful time. The Association members made me feel welcome and the class went well. (I spoke about best practices for use of the Patent Cooperation Treaty.) But that’s not the point of today’s post. The point of today’s post is to comment on the background music in the Nashville airport. Continue reading “The background music in the Nashville airport”
Please attend the OPLF reception in Orlando
Will you be in Orlando, Florida at the time of the 2016 meeting of INTA (the International T
rademark Association)? Are you a member of the E-Trademarks Listserv? Are you with a trademark or patent firm located outside of the US? Or are you with a corporation? If so, we hope you will join the people of Oppedahl Patent Law Firm LLC at our reception for the E-Trademarks Listserv. Our reception will take place at B B King’s Blues Club from 5PM to 8PM on Tuesday, May 24.
To learn more abut the reception, and to RSVP, please click here.
Post-reg astonishingly fast all of a sudden
A few months ago, trademark practitioners were comparing experiences with backlogs at “post-reg”. By this we mean the branch of the USPTO that handles papers filed after a trademark has registered. (The forum in which they discussed these backlogs is the E-trademarks listserv.) As of a few months ago, they were seeing backlogs in the range of 2-3 months. But recently things seem to have improved drastically. Continue reading “Post-reg astonishingly fast all of a sudden”
New Financial Manager system connects with more and more USPTO e-commerce systems
USPTO launched its “Financial Manager” system about two weeks ago. (At the same time, USPTO permanently shut down the wonderful “Financial Profile” system that had served users well for many years.)
When the Financial Manager (“FM”) system launched two weeks ago, it was connected with one e-commerce system, namely the system for paying patent maintenance fees. I blogged about the new maintenance fee payment system here.
Today the USPTO connected its new FM system to TEAS, the e-filing system for trademark application. I blogged about this new connection here.
This means that trademark filers no longer have to key in an entire credit card number when paying a fee. The filer can simply select the card from a drop-down list of stored payment mechanisms.
Today the USPTO also connected its new FM system to the online ordering system of the Office of Public Records. This ordering system, with the catchy name “OEMS”, now likewise permits you to select a payment mechanism from a stored list. This saves you having to key in detailed credit card information when placing such orders.
I have heard that in about a week, USPTO plans to connect FM to the EFS-Web system.
It’s clear from these developments that we all need to get familiar with FM. Presumably you configured your FM user accounts two weeks ago. But if you have not done so yet, you can visit the Financial Manager setup page to set things up.
Have you used FM? Please post a comment below to let readers know how it went for you.
Now trademark filers don’t need to key in credit card numbers
If, like me, you sometimes use a credit card to pay fees when filing a US trademark application, then you are accustomed to having to key in a sixteen-digit credit card number to pay the filing fee. Indeed you are accustomed to having to key in six categories of information — the credit card number, the expiration date, the CCV code, the cardholder name, the billing address, and the billing Zip code.
But as of today, you can skip all of that. You can use USPTO’s new Financial Manager (FM) system to store payment methods. When you do this (see screen shot at right), you can choose “stored payment method”. Then you select a stored payment method from a drop-down list. In this case I selected a Visa card. Then you key in the card security code and click “submit”.
This saves you having to key in five of the six categories of information mentioned above.
If you have not stored any payment methods in FM, then you can still proceed in the old-fashioned way, choosing “credit/debit card” and hand-keying the six categories of information.
In an office having high rates of employee turnover, this system will permit an employee to pay a trademark fee without the need to provide the actual credit card number or expiration date to the employee.
The FM system has been available for two weeks now. Presumably you configured your FM user accounts two weeks ago. But if you have not done so yet, you can visit the Financial Manager setup page to set things up.
Have you successfully paid a trademark fee using this new “stored payment” method? If so, please post a comment below and let me know how it went.
Conspicuous by its absence in the new USPTO Financial Manager system
A week ago USPTO launched its new Financial Manager system. A core component of this FM system is The New USPTO.gov Account system. As explained on the USPTO web site, The New USPTO.gov Account system “will one day be your single means of accessing USPTO services and applications”. In other words, it will be a successor to the present-day system of logging in at EFS-Web and Private PAIR.
Unfortunately, the designers of the new USPTO FM system (who I guess are the same as the designers of The New USPTO.gov Account system) failed to follow through on a promise that the USPTO made back in 2012. I’m talking about a promise to let the customer pick how much time would pass before the customer would get forced into a logout from the system.
Continue reading “Conspicuous by its absence in the new USPTO Financial Manager system”
Now you can hand-file applications in the four satellite patent offices!
The USPTO has made the long-awaited announcement that it is now possible to hand-carry patent and trademark applications for filing in the Detroit, Denver, San Jose, and Dallas patent offices. Each office has a staffed receiving window open until midnight local time, Monday through Friday, excepting federal holidays.
| Detroit patent office:
300 River Place South, Suite 2900, Detroit, MI 48207 Eastern time zone |
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| Denver patent office:
1961 Stout Street, Denver, CO 80294 Mountain time zone |
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| Dallas patent office:
207 South Houston Street, Dallas, TX 75202 Central time zone |
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| San Jose patent office:
26 South Fourth Street, San Jose, CA 95113 Pacific time zone |
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Importantly this will permit filers who are located nearby to the patent offices in Dallas, Denver, and San Jose to hand-carry patent and trademark applications to the local patent office until midnight local time, which is past midnight in Alexandria, Virginia. Such an application will receive a filing date based upon the local time. Thus for example a filer could get a same-day filing date in San Jose by hand carrying an application to the San Jose patent office just before midnight Pacific time, which is almost three hours past midnight in Alexandria, Virginia.
In its announcement, the USPTO cautions filers that if a patent application (other than a provisional application) is filed by means of hand-carrying, a $400 fee is charged for paper filing. That fee is reduced to $200 for a small entity and is further reduced to $100 for a micro entity.
Likewise a hand-carried trademark application incurs a higher government fee than an e-filed application, namely $375 per class as compared with $325 or less per class for an e-filed application.
According to the USPTO’s announcement, the new filing options are available starting today, April 1, 2016.
Have you tried out the new hand-carry filing options at any of these patent offices? If so, please post a comment below and describe how it went.
(Updated to admit that this is an April Fool’s posting.)