HELP & FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

It is extremely important to ensure that your proposed trade mark is free to be used before using it or applying to register it as your own trade mark. Our trade mark clearance searches will ensure that your proposed trade mark is not likely to be confused with any existing trade marks. The trade mark searches can be requested by using this form.

A standard trade mark search will take approximately 2-3 days to complete and costs £50 plus VAT. An express trade mark search takes 24 hours to complete and costs £70 plus VAT.

An application to register a trade mark in the UK will typically take around 4 months to register. However, if the Registrar or a third party raises an objection to the application then the registration process will take longer.

Yes, we can register a trade mark in almost any country of the world. Please see the relevant section of our website concerning European and International trade marks.

Yes, The Trade Marks Bureau has been representing clients at the UK Trade Marks Registry since 1987 and we are experienced in representing clients at the International Trade Marks Registry (WIPO). Furthermore, we are qualified to represent clients at the European Trade Marks Registry. Our Professional Representative Number is 25420.

Unfortunately we cannot guarantee that a trade mark will be accepted for registration as, although we are very experienced to provide advice on the acceptability of a proposed trade mark, it is not an exact science.  However, if we advise you that a trade mark is free for registration and distinctive enough for registration purposes in our advanced trade mark clearance search report then we will offer to guarantee the refund of our legal fees should the application be refused.

Our offer to refund our legal fees will be set out in the "standard" trade mark clearance search report.  If, in our opinion, an objection is likely to be raised against the Registrar or if there is a risk that a third party may oppose the application then we cannot offer to refund our fees should the application be refused.  However, you may still proceed with the application to register your trade mark without our offer to refund our fees.

We provide two different types of clearance searches, a free identical search and a standard trade mark search that costs £50 plus VAT.  If you only instruct us to perform the free identical search before proceeding with the application to register your trade mark then we cannot guarantee to refund our fees should the application be refused.

If you instruct us to perform our advanced standard searches and we advise in the search report that the trade mark is unlikely to infringe any existing trade marks already on the UK or European Community Trade Marks Register and that the proposed trade mark is distinctive enough for registration purposes then we will offer to guarantee to refund our legal fees should the application be refused.

The guarantee to refund our fees only relates to our fees associated with the filing of the application, it does not include a refund of the Statutory Fee (government fee) payable to the UK/EC Intellectual Property Office.

NO.  This is an important point about our business structure and the level of service that we provide to all our clients.  Unlike the vast majority of our competitors the fees that we quote include all statutory fees and our legal fees (competitors commonly quote fees that do not include statutory filing fees).

We do not charge any additional fees for responding to objections or other queries raised by the Trade Marks Registry.

We also do not charge any additional fees to defend an application against a third party opposition.

We strongly recommend that you compare not only the fees quoted by our competitors but also the level of service that you will receive.  We can virtually guarantee that the competitors fees you are comparing with ours do not include fees associated with objections raised by the Registry or the defence of an application should opposition proceedings be filed against your application.

Our fees are extremely competitive and, because we file so many applications, our fees are the lowest around.  Although our fees are low the level of service is very high.  For example, there are no hidden charges.  For example, most of our competitors charge additional fees for report back to you when the application has been examined, responding to objections raised by the Registry and defending the application against a third party opposition...WE DON'T.

Yes, if you find a competitor offering the same level of service at a lower fee then we will match that fee and then reduce it by a further 10%.

Yes, our qualified trade mark agents provide advice and support to our clients in respect to any matters relating to trade marks, designs and copyright.  We can also call upon support from our trade mark Attorney and, in respect to serious contentious issues, our legal trade mark Counsel.