You can access Central Fee Payment at the link below. To use it, you first have to register as a user. You can register either with a username (email address) and password or using the smart card authentication.
The EPO currently accepts the following credit cards: American Express, Mastercard and Visa.
No. Credit card payments must be made exclusively through Central Fee Payment. In the online filing forms, you can specify credit card as your chosen payment method, but this is only for information. Please do not enter any credit card data in the filing forms.
Yes. Note that you will need a smart card to be able to submit debit orders in Central Fee Payment.
If a credit card transaction fails before it is approved, the payment concerned is considered not to have been made. This applies irrespective of why the transaction failed, i.e. also if the failure was not attributable to the payer.
No. As the email address you give when registering to use Central Fee Payment is also your username, it cannot be used for more than one user account.
Yes. Multiple credit cards can be allocated to a single user account.
Simply click on the "Forgot your password?" link on the Central Fee Payment sign-in screen and you will receive an email with instructions on how to reset your password.
Yes. You can pay fees for specific applications or patents by choosing the procedure in question (PCT, EPC or Unitary Patent) and the fee category.
Yes. For example, if an applicant is entitled to a fee reduction, the payer should indicate it, and the system then applies it automatically. Also, the fees are selected from various fee groups; this helps users to choose the correct fee codes for the procedures concerned. The fee group Fees due is shown by default and shows the procedural fees due for a selected application based on the information available on file at the time.
No. You may however wish to consider opting for the automatic debiting procedure, which is available for deposit account holders.
No. A credit card payment cannot be deferred.
Yes. Until you confirm the payment, you can make changes either directly in the shopping cart or via a link from the cart to your fee selections.
No. A daily limit for credit card payments is set at EUR 10 000 per payer (see also OJ 2022, A18).
This new feature was introduced to improve the payment service and help users pay fees correctly and on time. It shows the procedural fees due for a selected application or patent based on the information available on file at the time.
The date indicated as the due date corresponds to the last day of the period for making the payment.
You can edit the fee amounts if you have made changes which have not yet been updated in the file but which would lead to different amounts. You are responsible for the correctness of any edited amounts.
Certain fees are not displayed in the "Fees due" fee group – mainly those that can be paid by third parties, such as opposition, appeal and administrative fees. For more information, see OJ EPO 2020, A130 .
For Unitary Patent fees you can only pay the fees in the Fees due or Administrative fees group. For European or international patent fees it is not mandatory to pay the fees in the "Fees due" fee group. However, we recommend using this feature.
Yes. However, you are responsible for the completeness/correctness of any edited amounts.
Please select another fee group. For Unitary Patent fees this is not possible, you can only pay due and administrative fees.
Yes. You can upload a batch payment file and select credit card as the payment method during checkout.
To make a batch payment you need to create a file in xml or csv format containing the relevant application numbers and payment details.
When you have saved your file:
The system will automatically recognise the different fields and calculate the total amounts. You can then either go directly to the checkout or add other fees to the cart.
The validation functionality detects and automatically rejects the following:
The automatic rejection of payments reduces the administrative work involved in refunding invalidly paid fees, for both users and the EPO.
The functionality only rejects double payments of fees that are payable only once in the proceedings, e.g. the filing fee or the third/fourth/fifth/etc. renewal fee. Fees that can be paid several times during the proceedings, such as the fee for further processing or the additional search fee in the event of non-unity, are excluded from double-payment validation.
After validation, you will receive a message, generated by the system, indicating that the payment could not be carried out. The message can be printed or downloaded at any time and is stored in your Rejected fee payment history, which can be found by going to Fees in the main navigation bar. This enables both you and the EPO to retrace the issue. Thus, if a payment is erroneously rejected, no loss of rights will ensue and the date of the attempted payment will be accepted as the payment date.
This means that you did not complete the checkout and payment process after the fee validation.
The validation of fees takes place during checkout, and rejected fees are automatically removed from your cart. However, you must continue the checkout, select a payment means and submit your order for the rejected fees to appear in your Rejected fee payment history.
If you do not check out, but instead go back to check the fees again or add additional fees, the rejected fees have already been removed from your cart and so will not be validated again. Therefore they will not appear in your Rejected fee payment history.
If all fees are rejected, you will not be able to complete the checkout and so these fees will not appear in your Rejected fee payment history.
Yes. Shortly after submitting the payment order you will receive a (printable) confirmation on screen that the transaction has been approved. This confirmation includes the date of payment, and is issued once the EPO receives approval of the transaction from the acquirer. It also includes one page for each application paid for within the transaction concerned.
Yes. Central Fee Payment includes a payment history function, enabling users to view the fees they have already paid and to download transaction confirmations. Each confirmation includes detailed information about the fees paid for the application or patent in question, and the date on which the transaction was approved.
The most likely reason is that your payment was not successful. Normally, this will be indicated on the screen in Central Fee Payment. A credit card transaction can fail for a variety of reasons. If this happens, we therefore recommend that you contact the bank that issued your credit card, and check for example that the right transaction limits are in place.
This information is encrypted, and you may then re-use it for further transactions. It is stored by the EPO's payment service provider, Ingenico ePayments, which is a Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI-DSS) certified organisation.
Furthermore, credit card acquirer Concardis has a contract to accept, approve and process, on the EPO's behalf, payments by credit card which result in a transfer of funds to the EPO. Concardis settles these payments with the card-issuing banks.
If you wish, you can save your credit card information for further payments. If you choose not to, you will indeed have to re-enter it every time you make a payment.
Yes. The EPO uses 3-D Secure for credit card transactions (as of 13.9.2019).
Please contact EPO Customer Services for clarification.
