In a situation where the Registry’s operations are interrupted and notified to be so by way of a Notice of Interruption in the Operations of the Patents Registry, Designs Registry and Trade Marks Registry (“Notice of Interruption”) as published in the Hong Kong Intellectual Property Journal, the deadline to remedy deficiencies originally set out in a Registrar’s deficiency notice issued under rule 11 of the Rules will be extended to a date specified in the Notice of Interruption, which will be the Registry’s first business day next following the day which interruption ends. To view a list of Notices of Interruption that the Registry has issued, please visit https://www.ipd.gov.hk/en/hk-ip-journal-notices/index.html. Pursuant to the Notice of Interruption issued in 2020 recently on 28 January, 1 February and 8 February respectively (“said Notices of Interruption”), if the deadline falls on any day between 29 and 31 January, 3 and 7 February, or 10 and 14 February 2020, it will be extended to 17 February 2020 (“New Deadline”).

Please note that the statutory time period to respond to the Registrar’s deficiency notice is non-extendible. Given the said Notices of Interruption, if the deficiencies are not remedied by the New Deadline, the part of your application in respect of the deficiencies shall be treated as abandoned. It is therefore very important for you to plan well ahead as to when you should take action in remedying the relevant deficiencies in your application, bearing in mind that time is also required for the Registry to properly consider your proposal to remedy.

When a Notice of Interruption is in force, the deadline to file written submissions/requests originally set out in the Registrar’s opinions issued under rule 13 of the Rules will be extended to a date specified in the relevant Notice of Interruption, which will be the Registry’s first business day next following the day which interruption ends. Given the said Notices of Interruption, if the deadline falls on any day between 29 and 31 January, 3 and 7 February, or 10 and 14 February 2020, it will be extended to the New Deadline of 17 February 2020.

The deadline to file submissions/requests under rule 13(2) and (5) of the Rules is extendible upon an applicant’s written request, subject to the conditions and requirements set out in rule 13(3) and (6) respectively of the Rules. Where a Notice of Interruption is in force, any request for time-extension made under rule 13(2) and (5) should be filed on or before the Registry’s first business day next following the day which interruption ends. In view of the said Notices of Interruption, a request for time-extension should be made on or before the New Deadline of 17 February 2020.

Not necessarily. If your original deadline falls on a date which is covered in such Notice, the deadline will be automatically extended to the first business day next following the day which interruption ends (“New Deadline”).

Parties are reminded that they should ensure that appropriate actions are taken by the New Deadline. This is particularly important where the original deadline is a non-extendible time limit under the Trade Marks Rules.

In normal circumstances, if your deadline is one to be determined by reference to the date of receipt of a document from the other party (e.g. for filing a counter-statement under rule 17(1) of the Rules), the deadline would begin to run from the date of receipt of the document (in this case, the notice of opposition). Hence, whether or not the date of receipt falls on a date covered in a Notice of Interruption should not affect the computation of your deadline in the following round.

For further information on service of documents, please refer to the Trade Marks Registry Work Manual – “Computation of time for service of documents between parties”, “Computation of time for filing at the Registry” and “Service of pleadings and evidence”.

In general, such deadline will be extended to the first business day of the Patents / Designs Registry next following the day which the interruption ends. Notwithstanding such extension of deadline, if the maintenance / renewal fee is paid via our e-filing system after lapse of the original deadline but before the lapse of the extended deadline, you are still required by the e-filing system to pay an additional fee for the “late” payment due to the system constraint. In such case, you are fully entitled to request refund of such fee afterwards.

While we will update the entries in the online registers of patents and designs as best as we can, there may still be discrepancies in exceptional cases. In case you notice that the status of your own patent / design application or registration is not correctly shown on the online register of patents / designs, please contact us so that we will look into your case accordingly.

Despite an interruption of operations, the Department maintains limited services and can be contacted as follows -

Moreover, our public service counter on 24/F Wu Chung House will remain open at specified hours to receive the physical filing of applications and documents from members of the public. For details on the exact opening hours, please refer to What’s New at https://www.ipd.gov.hk/en/home/whats-new/index.html. To safeguard your interests, we recommend that you consider using our electronic filing facility to the extent possible in the circumstance.