It seems to me that the PCT/RO/101 plug-in is missing a "Common Representative" field.
We, as the applicant, file our own PCT applications on-line via the EPO OLF. The "Agent", in our case, is one of the Patent Attorneys and an employee of the Applicant (company) and included in the General Authorisation.
If we use the "Agent" field, we receive a communication from the EPO informing us that the person an employee and not a professional representative...which is correct.
But, without a "Common Representative" field it is not possible to ensure that communications are directed to the correct Patent Attorney. Instead they are sent to the Applicant (company) without any "attention name".
How do we go about filling in the application correctly in order to reflect the use of a "common representative"?
Common Representative Field "missing"
Re: Common Representative Field "missing"
Hi,
I don't think that anything is missing but the interpretation of the options available is perhaps misleading.
The option "Agent" is for your representative i.e. the attorney, the option "Common representative" is only applicable if there are more than one applicant but no agents then the correspondence is sent to one of the applicants declared the "Common representative". In your case, however, you'd like to have the correspondence addressed to an individual inside your i.e. the applicants address - right?
Well, in this case, I see two options:
1. use the upper of the two "Address" fields to simply indicate something like "to the Attn. of Dr. XYZ" and give no further addresses (apart from inventors of course).
2. use the correspondence Address Option if the Address differs slightly from the official applicants address - in this case the option for common representative and agent will automatically dissappear as they are mutually exclusive.
Hope you find this useful - regards, Thorsten
I don't think that anything is missing but the interpretation of the options available is perhaps misleading.
The option "Agent" is for your representative i.e. the attorney, the option "Common representative" is only applicable if there are more than one applicant but no agents then the correspondence is sent to one of the applicants declared the "Common representative". In your case, however, you'd like to have the correspondence addressed to an individual inside your i.e. the applicants address - right?
Well, in this case, I see two options:
1. use the upper of the two "Address" fields to simply indicate something like "to the Attn. of Dr. XYZ" and give no further addresses (apart from inventors of course).
2. use the correspondence Address Option if the Address differs slightly from the official applicants address - in this case the option for common representative and agent will automatically dissappear as they are mutually exclusive.
Hope you find this useful - regards, Thorsten
at your service for the EPO Online Services Team!