Optional fees in IP Forecaster fall into two main categories. PTO Fees – Various PTOs around the world have optional fees for things like Accelerated Examination, Extensions, Sequence listings, etc. These are maintained by Prokurio and updated periodically as PTOs make changes. Law Firm Fees – Law firm and international associate optional fees like Office Action Responses, Application Amendments and document fees to name a few. These are custom and can be created as needed/desired in your system.
Let’s first take a look at how we can apply optional PTO fees in a forecast, followed by how to create and apply Law Firm optional fees in the same.
- Navigate to the Patent Forecast request screen and select a starting point jurisdiction for your forecast. Let’s start with US and add China, France and Germany. As you add additional countries, the tabs below will dynamically change based on your selections.
- In this example, under Filing Route, select National via Paris (this will bypass the route finder screen).
- In the tabs below, Application Details will be selected by default. Enter your claims and pages information for your forecast.
- To view the optional fees for the countries you selected, click on the Optional Fees tab.
- Each country selected will have it’s optional fees listed in their own sections. They will show the fee amount in the local currency, the fee source and the fee description. If there are additional optional fees for any country, a Show All button will be listed to allow you to expand the full list of available fees for that country.
- Click on any toggle switch beside the fee to include that fee in your forecast for that specific country. In this example, in the US, let’s turn on the PTO Fee – Extension – 1st Month.
- Click on the Create Forecast
- In your forecast results screen, click on the arrow beside the country you added your optional fee onto, then by the phase that fee would apply to in the lifecycle. In this case, the US Extension 1st Month applies during the prosecution phase.
- You now see your fee has been included in the forecasted estimate.
Let’s create a new law firm patent miscellaneous costs optional fee in your system that can be used in your forecasts.
- In your sidebar menu, click on Custom Fees to expand it, then click on {your firm name} fees.
- Click on the orange button Add Patent Fee to load the Fee Maintenance form.
- In the Fee Type field, click the dropdown and use type-ahead to narrow the list (type: misc), click on the Miscellaneous Costs fee type.
- Like all other fees you enter, now select a the Phase(s), Jurisdiction, Amount frequency, Amount and Currency for the fee.
- If your fee relates directly to a PTO fee, you may select that fee in the Related Patent PTO Filing Fees field. This ensures your fee is directly in line with its associated PTO fee in your forecast.
- Now check the Is Optional checkbox to indicate this fee is an optional fee and is intended to display under the Optional Fees tab in any forecast for your selected Jurisdiction above.
- Advanced Settings: This section allows to have your fee be claims or pages based. It also allows Advanced logic for relating your fee to a specific action (i.e. Translation, Priority, Office Action, EP Validation, etc)
- Timeline Position: Defaults to application after zero months, this does not affect the phase selected above, but to set where in the timeline (fee applicable date) you specifically want this fee to show in your forecast.
- Click on the Save button at the bottom to save your new optional fee.
- In our example, we created at miscellaneous costs fee of $200 during the application phase of any US patent forecast.
- Now in any forecast you do (like the one earlier in this guide) if US is a country selected, then under the Optional Fees tab you will be able to toggle the fee on or off as desired.
- If toggled on, you now see your optional fee in your forecast results.
If you need any additional assistance, please contact us at hello@prokurio.com, and we’ll get you the answers you need!
