Calculation of Notice Period for Patent Examination Is Changed from Day Count to Month Count as of September 1, 2008.

  From September 1, 2008, the specified periods for making a response to all notifications with respect to examination and reexamination on applications for invention, utility model, and design patents should be measured by months instead of by current practice of day count.  Deadlines for making a response will be relaxed for filed patent applications for practice transition purpose.

　Under current practice, the specified period of notifications issued by TIPO patent examiners is measured by days.  In foreign invention patent application cases, the specified period for making a response to examination opinion notice is 90 days, beginning from the day following that when the notice is received.  After thorough consideration and study of the patent examination practices of other countries that mostly calculate the specified period on month count basis, it is decided that the specified period for all notices should be changed from day count to month count, except for some cases given a notification period of less than 30 days.  Also, according to the first paragraph of Article 20 of the Patent Act, the duration of such specified period does not include the commencement date.  Calculations of periods should follow Article 48 of the Administrative Procedure Act.

　In case where the specified period is 3 months, the expiration day of this period should be calculated as follows:

1.  Where the TIPO’s notification letter is received on August 31, the specified period shall commence on September 1 (the commencement day does not count) and end on November 30 (According to Paragraph 3, Article 48 of the Administrative Procedure Act, the period shall end on the day preceding the date of the last month that corresponds to that on which it began to run).  Therefore, the applicant shall submit original documents or make supplement or amendment before November 30.

2.  Where the TIPO’s notification letter is received on August 30, the specified period shall commence on August 31 (Likewise, the first day does not count) and end on November 30 (According to Paragraph 3, Article 48 of the Administrative Procedure Act, since there is no corresponding date of 31st in November, the period shall end on the last day of November).

3.  Additionally, according to Paragraph 4, Article 48 of the Administrative Procedure Act, if the last day of the period falls on Sunday, national holiday, or any other holiday, the day following that shall take its place.  Also, if the last day of the period falls on Saturday, its last day shall be the Monday of the following week.  For instance, if the last day of the period falls on October 10 which is a national holiday of Taiwan, the last day of the period shall be October 11).

　TIPO will give a more relaxed deadline to those patent applications subject to day count basis, for which TIPO examiners had issued notifications before August 31, 2008 so as to protect these applicants’ rights and interests.  (2008.7)

/CCS