Patent decision

BL number

O/356/04

Concerning rights in

PCT/IB99/00178

Hearing Officer

Mr M C Wright

Decision date

6 December 2004

Person(s) or Company(s) involved

Mr Al Pasha Al Bahdaini

Provisions discussed

Patents Rules 1995, Rule 110(4)

Keywords

Extensions of time, PCT application

Related Decisions

None

Summary

The applicant, who is an Iraqi national living as a refugee in Switzerland, did not wish to attend a hearing and so the decision was based on the papers on file. His argument for not entering the national phase within the prescribed period was that Government sanctions, which froze the UK bank accounts of Iraq nationals between 1990 and 2003, prevented him from paying the £10 fee necessary to enter the national phase. However, the Hearing Officer refused to allow the extension request as there was no evidence that he was prevented from paying the fee direct from Switzerland. To the contrary the Swiss authorities had informed the Office that there were no such restrictions. Moreover, the applicant had failed to explain to the Office why he could pay the equivalent fee to enter the PCT national phase in Australia but not in the UK. In view of this and the fact that three years had elapsed before the applicant decided to apply for an extension, the Hearing Office, in applying the principles established in Heatex Group Ltd’s Application [1995] RPC 546, refused to allow the extension as he was not satisfied that the applicant had a continuing underlying intension to enter the national phase within the prescribed period.