Guidelines for Examination in the EPO

Guidelines for Examination - Table of Contents

PART B GUIDELINES FOR SEARCH

CHAPTER IV SEARCH PROCEDURE AND STRATEGY

CHAPTER III CHARACTERISTICS OF THE SEARCH

CHAPTER V PRECLASSIFICATION (ROUTING) AND OFFICIAL CLASSIFICATION OF EUROPEAN PATENT APPLICATIONS

1. Procedure prior to searching

1.2 Formal deficiencies

1.2	Formal deficiencies

The search is carried out in parallel with the formalities examination. If the examiner notices any formal shortcomings which have been overlooked by the Receiving Section, he calls these, by means of an internal communication, to the attention of the Receiving Section (or of the Examining Division in the case of an additional search requested by that Division) which takes appropriate action. However, the examiner should not repeat the tasks of the Receiving Section and should not undertake any time-consuming enquiries into these matters. Such deficiencies which the examiner might notice include:

Rules 30-34, 41 to 50

Art. 53(a)

Rule 48

(i)	physical deficiencies of the application (see A-III, 3.2), including:

Art. 90(3)

Rule 57

(a)

no paper and/or no electronic sequence listing (Rule 30(1) and Special edition No. 3, OJ EPO 2007, C.1);

(b)

incorrect sequence and/or positioning of page numbering and/or failure to use Arabic numerals in page numbering (Rule 49(6));

(c)

presence of drawings in the description and/or claims (Rule 49(9));

(d)

presence of erasures and/or alterations in the application documents, such that the authenticity of the content and/or the requirements for good reproduction are jeopardised (Rule 49(12));

(ii)	presence of prohibited matter in the application:

Art. 53(a)

Rule 48(1)(a)

Rule 48(1)(b)

(a)

which is contrary to "ordre public" (see A-III, 8.1, C-II, 7.2 and C-IV, 4.1 to 4.3); or

(b)

constituting disparaging statements (see A-III, 8.2). Note, however, that fair comment as referred to in C-II, 7.3 is permitted;

(iii)

failure to comply with the provisions relating to the deposition of biological material (see A-IV, 4), in particular with regard to the correct identification in the application of the depository institution and accession number of the biological material assigned to the deposited material by the depository institution (Rule 31(1)(c), see G 2/93, OJ 5/1995, 275 and A-IV, 4.2).

Rules 31-Rule 33

(iv)	failure to correctly identify the application as a divisional application within the meaning of Art. 76(1) (see A-IV, 1.3.2, Rule 41(2)(e)).

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Guidelines for Examination in the EPO