| Mail Issues, Office Closures, Postal Emergencies, etc. |
Referenced Items (5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60) |
(11) Emergency Closing of the
Customer Service Window on
Wednesday, March 2, 2011
On March 2, 2011, at approximately 11:00 p.m., the United States Patent
and Trademark Office (USPTO) Customer Service Window located in the Randolph
Building in Alexandria, Virginia, was unexpectedly closed due to a power
outage. In light of this emergency situation, the USPTO will consider
Wednesday, March 2, 2011, to be a "Federal holiday within the District of
Columbia" under 35 U.S.C. § 21 and 37 C.F.R. §§ 1.6, 1.7, 1.9, 2.2(d)
2.195 and 2.196. Any action or fee due on Wednesday, March 2, 2011, will be
considered as timely for the purposes of, e.g., 15 U.S.C. §§ 1051(b), 1058,
1059, 1062(b), 1063, 1064, and 1126(d), or 35 U.S.C. §§ 119, 120, 133 and
151, if the action was taken, or the fee paid, on the next succeeding
business day on which the USPTO was open, that is, Thursday, March 3, 2011
(37 C.F.R. §§ 1.7(a) and 2.196).
37 C.F.R. §§ 1.6(a)(2), 2.195(a)(4) and 2.198 provide that correspondence
deposited in the Express Mail Service of the United States Postal Service
(USPS) in accordance with 37 C.F.R. §§ 1.10 or 2.198 will be considered filed
on the date of deposit (as shown by the "date-in" on the Express Mail mailing
label) with the USPS. Thus, any paper or fee properly deposited in the
Express Mail Service of the USPS on Wednesday, March 2, 2011, in accordance
with 37 C.F.R. §§ 1.10 or 2.198 will be considered filed on its respective
date of deposit in the Express Mail Service of the USPS (as shown by a
"date-in" of March 2, 2011, on the Express Mail mailing label).
37 C.F.R. §§ 1.6(a)(4) and 2.195(a)(2) provide that patent and trademark-
related correspondence transmitted electronically to the USPTO will be
considered filed in the USPTO on the date the USPTO received the electronic
transmission. Thus, any patent and/or trademark-related correspondence
transmitted electronically to the USPTO on Wednesday, March 2, 2011, will be
considered filed in the USPTO on the date the USPTO received the complete
electronic transmission. Patent correspondence successfully received by the
USPTO through the Electronic Filing System (EFS-Web) and filed in compliance
with the EFS-Web Legal Framework will receive the date as indicated on the
Acknowledgement Receipt. See the Manual of Patent Examining Procedure (MPEP)
§ 502.05 and the USPTO Web site at
www.uspto.gov/patents/process/file/efs/guidance/New_legal_framework.jsp.
March 30, 2011 DAVID J. KAPPOS
Under Secretary of Commerce for
Intellectual Property and Director of the
United States Patent and Trademark Office
[1365 OG 229]
Top of Notices (11) December 27, 2011