Case Law of the Boards of Appeal

A procedural change introduced with the EPC 2000 concerns the payment of supplementary search fees in case of non-unity. Under the provisions of the EPC 1973 the applicant was able to pay, on entry into the European phase, additional search fees for inventions not searched in the PCT phase (R. 112 EPC 1973). Under the new provisions, the applicant has to pay for the supplementary search which is always performed unless the EPO was the International Searching Authority, but can no longer pay for additional searches in respect of inventions that were not searched during the international phase (R. 164 EPC). With regard to the latter ones, divisional applications can be filed after entry into the European phase.