WARNING! Scams Target IP Owners
Article from our Winter 2008-2009 edition of InsideIP.
We would like to remind our clients and associates to be on the lookout for scam letters being sent to them by unofficial registration services.
An increasing number of companies and individuals who own or have applied for UK or European Community trade marks and UK or European patents, are being targeted by these organisations and, in some cases, have fallen victim to scams costing them hundreds or thousands of pounds.
The letters come from a range of organisations using very official-sounding names such as “European Communities Trademark Filing Services”, “IOPTS – International Patents & Trademark Service LLC” and “Patent Trademark Register”. They are generally ‘inviting’ trade mark or patent owners to sign up to a register of patents and/or trade marks but in most cases there is little or no information about the register itself.
The letters look official and in many cases are intended to look like invoices. For this reason a great many appear to make their way straight to accounts departments and can be paid without proper checks. This can be a costly mistake.
Here are a few points to note to help guard against you becoming the latest casualty of these scams:
• All correspondence relating to trade marks or patents that Venner Shipley handles on your behalf will come to you from us on our letterheaded paper. If you receive correspondence from any other entity, please let us know immediately. On rare occasions the Patent and Trade Mark Offices may inadvertently send correspondence directly to you. Take care correctly to identify such correspondence and let us know immediately. It may contain important information concerning deadlines.
• Inform your accounts department of these scams and ask them to refer to you any suspicious ‘invoices’ or invitations to pay.
• If you identify one of the scam letters, or if you believe it to be so and are not certain, send it to us or telephone us and we can advise immediately and free of charge whether any action should be taken.