7.6. Handwritten amendments during oral proceedings before the board

In T 1635/10 the board took note of the notice from the EPO of 8 November 2013 (OJ 2013, 603) regarding the practice on handwritten amendments to patent documents. In the case in hand, the documents as proposed for the maintenance of the patent contained handwritten amendments, carried out at the oral proceedings before the board. For the board to do what was required by the above notice would, in the case in hand, be detrimental to the principles of due process and procedural economy. The board therefore found that the documents as presented at the oral proceedings, for which the above checks could easily be performed and on which the appellant had had the opportunity to comment, were sufficient to base its (final) decision on. Since the department of first instance in any case would have to perform further formal steps before it actually maintained the patent in accordance with the board's order, it could apply its new practice to the relevant documents. See also T 37/12.