ARCHIVED — Proposed Practice Notice on corrections of assignment-related information on Patent Office and Industrial Design Office records

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Patents and Industrial Designs

NOTE: This practice notice is intended to provide guidance on current Canadian Intellectual Property Office (CIPO) practice and interpretation of relevant legislation and should not be quoted as, or considered to be, a legal authority. In the event of any inconsistency between this notice and the applicable legislation, the legislation must be followed. It is the responsibility of the applicant/patentee to decide how to proceed with respect to a particular application or other matter.

As per sections 49 and 50 of the Patent Act and subsection 13(1) of the Industrial Design Act, the Office takes the position that in order to register/record an assignment, the original or a copy of the original assignment document must be submitted to the Office.  Occasionally, an error is present in said document and/or an error is made in the entry of information in the Office's records.  

A variety of commonly seen errors can be corrected by filing an appropriate request.  Such request may be filed depending upon the circumstances by one of the parties to the assignment request or by the applicant, owner, or agent on file.

It is important to note that despite the correction of an error, all documents that are registered/recorded by the Office will remain on record subject to a court order to the contrary.

Error in the Office's records

Where an error appears in the information on record at the Office (for example in techsource) but where the registered/recorded document displays accurate information, the Office will correct the error upon receipt of a simple request detailing the nature of the error and referring to the registered/recorded document containing the accurate information. No fee will be required for the correction.

Error in an assignment document

Where the wrong document was registered/recorded or where the registered/recorded document contains a mistake, the Office will register/record a new and correct assignment document upon receipt of a request to that effect stating that the registered/recorded assignment is incorrect (and therefore not a valid assignment). The request must be accompanied by the correct assignment document, information and the fee associated with the registration/recordal of an assignment document. The information in the Office’s records will then be modified accordingly.

Where a document is incorrectly registered/recorded as an assignment but no assignment actually occurred, the Office will modify the information in its records upon receipt of a request to that effect containing a clear explanation of how the error originally occurred.  No fee will be required.

It is worthwhile noting that an erroneous assignment may be corrected if an appropriate request to that effect is filed before grant/registration. Similarly, an erroneous assignment that is registered/recorded after grant/registration may be corrected. However, the name of the owner recognized at grant/registration cannot be modified. Consequently, no correction will be performed by the Office, when the request to that effect is filed after grant/registration with regard to an assignment registered/recorded before grant/registration.

Clerical errors

The type of errors that can be corrected as a clerical error is generally limited to errors that arose in the mechanical process of typewriting or transcribing. These errors may be corrected through section 8 of the Patent Act and section 20 of the Industrial Design Act.  The request for a correction under the appropriate section of the relevant Act should be accompanied by the supporting information and prescribed fee.   

Jurisdiction of the Federal Court

In order to obtain a change that will further alter the content of Office records, such as the removal of a previously registered/recorded document, a requester may need to seek the intervention of the Courts.