Practice Notice

Payment of fees: general authorizations to charge deficiencies to deposit accounts and credit cards.

Publication Date: 2006-07-12

NOTE: This notice is intended to provide guidance on current Trade-marks Office practice and interpretation of relevant legislation. However, in the event of any inconsistency between this notice and the applicable legislation, the legislation must be followed.

A decision of the Federal Court of Canada, Government of the U.S.A. et al. v. the Commissioner of Patents (T-1995-04) addresses broad authorization statements contained in cover letters and how they may constitute a clear and valid authorization for the Commissioner of Patents to debit deposit accounts or credit card accounts for additional sums of money needed to effect payment of fees when there is a clear intent to pay a fee.

As a result of this decision, the Trade-marks Office has reviewed its practice in relation to the acceptance of general authorization statements to charge a deficiency to deposit accounts or credit cards and effective immediately will apply the following practice.

In the processing of a fee payment, if there is a clear and obvious intent to pay a fee yet the submitted amount is deficient and the authorized payer has included a general authorization statement to charge any fee deficiency to a deposit account or credit card currently on file, the Office will charge the deposit account or credit card the appropriate fee, assuming there are sufficient funds.

It is important to note that the inclusion of a general authorization statement when making a fee payment does not exempt the applicant or registered owner from taking any other action required to fulfill the conditions required pursuant to the Trade-marks Act and Trade-marks Regulations (1996). Therefore, in situations where paying a fee is not the only action required, applicants and registered owners should ensure that all appropriate actions have been taken.

xPlease note that the Office will not speculate as to which service the fee is intended to be applied. In spite of a general authorization statement, if the communication is unclear as to the intention of the payer, the Office will not process the fee payment. Therefore, when a payer submits a fee payment, they should provide the Office with as much information as possible with regard to the service for which the payment is being submitted.

Furthermore, in order to avoid confusion, the Office strongly recommends the use of a general authorization statement such as the following:

Should the fees submitted with this letter be insufficient to cover all of the fees for which payment is requested by this letter, the Office is authorized to charge the amount of the insufficiency to [deposit account No...] or [indicate firm] [indicate credit card type] account already on file.

It is the responsibility of the applicant or registered owner to ensure their deposit account or credit card contains sufficient funds to cover all fee payments. If two accounts are identified by the payer, the Office will, where necessary, attempt to withdraw from them in the order in which they appear in the general authorization statement. If the sources of funds are insufficient, the Office will not be able to debit the account as instructed in the general authorization statement.