a) Serious illness 

In T 447/13 the board held that, for the purposes of deciding whether to grant a request for postponement of oral proceedings on grounds of illness, "serious illness" means an illness which is sufficiently serious to prevent the representative travelling to oral proceedings and satisfactorily presenting the case on the appointed day.

In T 1246/10 the board accepted a first postponement of the oral proceedings in view of the exacerbation of the appellant's serious illness and the fact that the respondent did not object to a postponement. However, the board refused the second request to postpone oral proceedings filed less than one month before the scheduled date. The respondent opposed any postponement thereof. Furthermore, the board had no indication that a further postponement for a few months could change the appellant's personal health situation. The appellant should have appointed a representative if he could not attend the oral proceedings himself.

Regarding the illness of a duly represented party or inventor, see chapter III.C.6.1.4 h).