2.3.3 Preliminary opinions on admissibility

In T 222/85 (OJ 1988, 128) the board stated that a communication under R. 57(1) EPC 1973 (R. 79(1) EPC) indicating that an "admissible notice of opposition" had been filed within the opposition period was not a decision of the opposition division, and the sending of such a communication did not prevent the subsequent rejection of the notice of opposition as inadmissible under R. 56(1) EPC 1973 (R. 77(1) EPC), for example if the admissibility was challenged by the patent proprietor. The contents of a "communication" never constitute an appealable "decision". Thus, the communication, even though it had been sent after the notice of opposition had presumably been examined for admissibility, only represented a preliminary view, on an ex parte basis, and was not binding upon the department of the EPO which sent it (see also T 621/91).