USPTO News: New PCT Transmittal and Search Fees Effective in January

    By Christopher P. Singer --

In a Notice published in the Federal Register (73 Fed. Reg. 47534) on Wednesday, November 12, 2008, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office announced new fees for the transmittal and search for international applications filed under the Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT).  The fees are designed to recover the estimated average cost to the Office of processing PCT international applications and preparing international search reports and written opinions for PCT international applications.  The new PCT transmittal fee will be $240 (adjusted from the current fee of $300), and the new search fee where the USPTO is acting as the International Searching Authority will be $2,080 (up from the current fee of  $1,800).  The supplemental search fee for each examined additional invention, which applicants have the option of requesting will also increase to $2,080, from the current fee of $1,800.  The fees will apply to international applications having a receipt date that is on or after January 12, 2009.

Comments

[anonymousAgent]

Before they raise fees, let them provide a PCT search report on an application I filed over THREE years ago

[Chris Singer]

anonymousAgent - Your comment made me laugh, because its true. From the "glass is half full" perspective, once you receive your Search Report at least you'll have a couple months to file some comments/amendments in your (now expired) PCT to any IPRP/Written Opinion that accompanies your Search Report !!

I remember hearing/reading that the PTO had been outsourcing PCT searches, which would mean there shouldn't be any reason for these types of delay. But, we do only what we can, I guess.

Thanks for reading