Patent Practice: Annual Practitioner Maintenance Fee.

[NEW RULES] The USPTO has announced final rules to implement an annual practitioner maintenance fee. According to the new rules effective December 17, 2008, a practitioner who fails "to pay the annual practitioner maintenance fee required under § 11.8(d) [will] be administratively suspended." Easy to remember, the Fee under Section 11.8 is $118.

What is the point: The $118 fee will raise two or three million dollars for the PTO. Although that money is useful, the primary purpose of the fee is not to raise money. Rather, it an easy way to cull the list of registered practitioners by removing those who are not making money as patent attorneys. In the words of the office, the purposes of the fee include "protecting the public, preserving the integrity of the Office, and maintaining high professional standards."

When folks forget to pay:

[A] paper submitted in good faith by a practitioner who does not know that he or she has been administratively suspended for failure to pay the annual practitioner maintenance fee will be treated as unsigned. In the case of a new complete application, the applicant will receive a filing date because the signature of an attorney or agent on transmittal papers is not required. In the case of an unsigned bona fide response to an Office action, the submission will be treated in accordance with 37 CFR 1.135(c), and applicant may be given a new period of time to supply the omission. Practitioners should be aware, however, that submission of a response having an omission may affect patent term adjustment pursuant to 37 CFR 1.704(c)(7). In the case of an issue fee payment, an unsigned issue fee transmittal form may lead to abandonment of the application, in which case a petition to revive would be required.

 Who can afford this?

The Office estimates that, in 2006, the average annual income in the United States of solo practitioners was $231,777; of patent attorneys who are partners in private firms, $434,464; of patent attorneys who are associates in private firms, $152,677; and of corporate IP attorneys, $198,109; and the average annual salary of patent agents in a firm in the United States was $92,761. AIPLA Report of the Economic Survey 2007.

In many ways, the high average incomes of patent attorneys and patent agents are due to the limits created by the PTO.  When only a few can practice patent law, those few are able to charge higher prices.  Under traditional protectionist thinking, the Bar would want to take steps that solidify the monopoly by encouraging further barriers to entry and take pains to show that the limits on practice lead to better results.

Notes:

• These final rules are based on a minor portion of a five-year-old 2003 notice of proposed rulemaking. [LINK]
• The proposed rules would have added continuing education requirements as well.
• At that time, the AIPLA stated that it was “conceptionally … not opposed to an annual fee for registered practitioners.” The organization was, however, concerned with the practicalities of paying and with the problems created by attorneys forgetting to pay.
• The following anonymous coment was submitted in response to the 2003 rule proposal:

Dear Bureaucrats: Stuff your annual fees for attorneys and agents. You are really getting to be a bunch of greedy pigs. The fee structure is venal and complex enough as it is. Actually taxes should pay for mast of the PTO, but while you are not to blame for that, your asskissing desire to show your superiors haw you can rake in profits with nasty, petty little fees for ever trivial action is on your heads. Stuff your continuing education also. If you people would keep your Rules of Practice up to date and written in intelligible language instead of insider bureaucratic gobbledygook there would be no need for continuing education. How hard is is to keep your Rules up to date in this era of wordprocessing? If the Manual of Patent Examining Procedure has grown from 1 inch to 5 inches in the span of a couple of decades, maybe the problem is with too many stupid petty rules and fees to understand. God knows writing patent applications isn't that hard. We need a five inch manual for this? Are you people martyrs over there? All I ever hear is whining and attitude that the public should do all the work in prosecuting patent applications so the poor bureaucrats can twiddle their thumbs. Why don't you get it over with and specify that applicants should do a self?examination as to patentability and swear that it is accurate under penalty of law so that the Patent Office doesn't have to do anything? You people are out of control. It is time the the PTO is privatized so we get less attitude.

Comments

[EG]

I'd be interested as to where this Notice shows up on the USPTO web site. From what I can see, it's either not there, or it's cleverly hidden.

[GP]

Notice on Website? Wouldn't that be an obvious step to take?
Instead, you'll have to wade through 14megabytes of the semimonthly independent inventors - - - whatever conference.
It's amazing that so much of PTO propaganda is directed to the small inventor when the system is substantially rigged, and moreso every day, against that small inventor.
But to look at it from the outside all you'll see is the PTO catering to joe 6.1 pack inventor.

As for this fee, it's not for raising money? It's to cull?
Please. What is the cost to the PTO to maintain "cullable" Reg Numbers?
How does that cost compare to the implementation of this fee?
The part i love about government - they implement something like this to raise money and 1. They say it's not to raise money and 2. They are going to end up burning 10% to 50% of the money on the implementation and enforcement of it.

Further, a portion of all USPTO proceeds go to the general fund, I'd like to be the first to say how glad I am that another avenue has now been created for me to personally fund the expansion of the occupation of Afghan1stan and the handing of free food to 0bese "poor" mothers of 4+ children.

As a final note, if you really want to "cull" the herd, why not just set up a CLE system? That'd clear 'em out faster than 118 bucks. What? No money in it?

Gotta love the Atla5 Shrugged direction of the US government - not only are we bearing down on s0cialism/fasc1sm at an impressive rate, we're using all of the pretend new speak that you'd never have believed possible with a semi-conscious population.

Remember people, there is no recession, we, the public, are going to make money on the 700b handout to bank5ters, and the 118 dollar fee, which is certain to never increase, is not for raising money, it's for culling.

And the chocolate ration has been increased to 100 grams c0mrades.

[Leopold Bloom]

Although I'm not violently opposed to this idea, I'm not sure I understand how culling the list of registered practitioners to those who pay the fee serves the purpose of "protecting the public, preserving the integrity of the Office, and maintaining high professional standards."

Culling the list occasionally is not a bad idea, but this could be done with a fee every two years, or five, ...

[Brian L.]

The $118 doesn't really bother me, but what really frightens me is that sooner or later someone at the USPTO will have the crazy idea that by raising this fee to $50,000/yr they can "improve patent quality."

[anonymousAgent]

What's this - the PTO writes:
"protecting the public, preserving the integrity of the Office, and maintaining high professional standards" - hahahaha - the CURRENT PTO management actual management wrote about "preserving the integrity of the Office"
---
Tell me - did Margaret Peterlin "preserve the integrity of the Office" when, in public, she asked local MBAs to bail her out of the backlog problem ???

[Yossarian]

The true motivation probably is to allow Harry Moatz to fund a new wave of disciplinary proceedings against practitioners, probably arising from IDS filings of references that the practitioner did not read before filing.

[anonymousAgent]

I'm sorry - I meant "MBA students"

[Admiral]

Is the author of this post being serious, that there is really a public protection motivation here? I suppose it might be possible if they completely lacked any education whatsoever, but... it looks like a revenue raiser to me!

[Roger Karp]

Merry Christmas from the USPTO!

[PhilS]

If this funds the PTO's online CLE program its ok with me.

One thing does trouble me though, no fee is required for trademark prosecutors who are also appearing before the USPTO. Seems like a double standard to me.

[question]

How is the public being protected exactly?

[anon]

I'd imagine if you've gotten a job at a major firm this fee won't really be a big deal. However, this hurts practitioners like me who are just starting out and barely making our student loan payments, yet we have to pay a significant annual fee to be a part of the 'elite'.

[Steve M]

..."protecting the public, preserving the integrity of the Office, and maintaining high professional standards."...

...if only PTO leadership were held; and held themselves; to the same worthy standards they're asking of others.

[GP]

Anon wrote:
"However, this hurts practitioners like me who are just starting out and barely making our student loan payments, yet we have to pay a significaFnt annual fee to be a part of the 'elite'."

CaChing!!!! More money for Gideon Pope.

The only thing that that the Patent Office can do to actually stem the acceleration in my daily income would be to nationalize all patents and applications, and even that might not work.

Bottom line, it's like the Hawthorne effect:

Patent Office makes new rule - I make more money.
Patent Office delete old rule - I make more money.
Patent Office goes about its usual nonsensical routine of "improving patent prosecution", I make more money.

It always cracks me up to see the "purists" clinging to the notion that the whole PTO system is somehow not a joke of which they are a definite and well-paid part.

Really, if it weren't for the JDs and the Judges wouldn't this just be the DMV on crack?

So we get paid unGodly sums to play our part - and, for most of us, it seems, that means acting outraged when the Office does something, as it usually does, stupidly.

You know you understand that "THERE IS NO SPOON" when you are exuberant when you hear that the Patent Office is about to implement "positive changes" to the patent prosecution process.

Why?

Because "positive changes", while almost always certainly not positive for applicants or patentees, will invariably have the net effect of making you worth more money.

Gideon's tip of the day:

Care very much that you are doing your best to represent your clients, but care not at all about the "integrity" of the patent system.

Get there, and it's all fun and money. Least it is from where I'm sittin'. No Cons? 1 RCE limit? 24 point font for appeals and 20 page limit? Reference analysis? 500 bucks an ID claim? It's all just silliness scattered in a world that is less real than Teletubby land.

The system is going down. Get it? It's going down, and there's nothing you can do to stop it's descent. So milk madly, and viddy well, my sisters and brothers, because the gravy train can't continue for ever. Make the money, relax about the PTO insanity, rep the hell out of the clients, and enjoy the relative prosperity [whisper]it's going bye-bye soon[/whisper]

[David Stein]

I'm getting a major kick out of this comment:

"The $118 annual practitioner maintenance fee is
calculated on the basis of the cost of maintaining the roster, including the disciplinary system."

What, exactly, does the OED do with my entry in their database that involves $118 ANNUALLY?!

When I passed the USPTO bar exam in 2000, I provided fourteen alphanumeric fields of information. They created a single record for me containing those fields.

When I passed the Ohio bar exam in 2002, I asked them to change my "Title" field from "Agent" to "Attorney." They obliged.

When I accepted a job in 2003, I asked them to change my "Firm Name," "Address," and "Primary Telephone" fields. They obliged.

When I accepted another job in early 2007, I asked them to change these same three fields again. They obliged.

According to the USPTO's logic, those four actions cost the USPTO a total of $944 in OED administrative costs ($118 x 8.)

Let's cut through the BS: this is simply a penalty exacted against the PTO's perceived enemy - the patent bar - in response to the mass opposition of its bone-headed, anti-patent policies. It has unilateral power to extort funds from us, and it now wishes to punish us. Q.E.D.

I suppose these fees will help fund the the USPTO's patent policy group in its neverending quest to throw increasingly inane obstacles in our way in order to reduce filings. My tax dollars at work...

- David Stein

[David Stein]

In response to PhilS:

"If this funds the PTO's online CLE program its ok with me."

Yeah, uh... I need practice guidance from the PTO like my pet turtle needs a bicycle. I'd rather take CLEs from Prof. Malcolm Mooney.

First - the USPTO's recent positions in CAFC cases and its communications with the patent bar demonstrate that it's out of touch with patent practice, administrative law, business realities, modern science, and the English language. It understands only one thing: how to create a very slow, outrageously expensive system for rejecting patent applications.

Second - I've attended probably six of the USPTO's presentations over the past four years. Only one (its recently "Partnering in Patents" program) was of value, and for very different reasons than those it probably had in mind. The rest have been uninformative, droll affairs - lengthy and patronizing recitals from 35 USC; charts and stats that are implausible and/or incomprehensible; and Q&A sessions filled with pointed comments of attendees and much artful dodging by bureaucratic presenters.

Third - are you familiar with the phrase, "if you give a kid a hammer, everything becomes a nail?" If we fund a USPTO CLE pilot program, we can absolutely expect a rapid ascent in the frequency of administrative rule tweaks by the USPTO, each necessitating attendance at a USPTO CLE program (and probably with a minimum quota for staying regged.) And undoubtedly, these CLEs will not be free - after all, we greedy practitioners average about $700 billion in annual salary, right?

- David Stein

[Malcolm Mooney]

"The system is going down. Get it? It's going down, and there's nothing you can do to stop it's descent. So milk madly, and viddy well, my sisters and brothers, because the gravy train can't continue for ever. Make the money, relax about the PTO insanity, rep the hell out of the clients, and enjoy the relative prosperity [whisper]it's going bye-bye soon[/whisper]"

It's going to be a weird year.

[AllSeeingEye]

Dennis says: "In many ways, the high average incomes of patent attorneys and patent agents are due to the limits created by the PTO. When only a few can practice patent law, those few are able to charge higher prices." What a bunch of sour grapes.

I'm sorry Dennis, but its not like the admission limits are arbitrary. As a registered practitioner who worked long and hard to get there, I resent your suggestion that somehow the PTO's limits are just some kind of ploy. The PTO requires certain degrees or equivalent, and passing an examination of the practice rules. Not everyone can run right out and get an engineering degree, that is unless getting engineering degrees somehow becomes easy in a dumbed-down world. I sure hope not. I doubt the technology community or the public for that matter would be well served by letting just anyone practice.

What with the sour grapes post on fees, and the above comments, one has to wonder what kind of agenda you're developing as time marches forward. I'm seriously starting to wonder whether I'm going to continue visiting this site. You do sound a little like Mooney (note the sick post above).

[Humorless Democrat]

To cull out inactive pracitioners? Yeahright. And I've got a bridge in Brooklyn to sell you, or some swampland in Florida. A $1 fee would be sufficient to cull out inactive practitioners, but it wouldn't make any money for the PTO or Uncle Sam. Earth to PTO rule makers: just b/c you're a bunch of meatheads doesn't practitioners are too.

(BTW, I'm not opposed in principle to an annual registration fee - lots of state bars have 'em - but the disingenous rationale given by the PTO really pi$$es me off.)

[Malcolm Mooney]

If Kevin Noonan promises to repeal this illegal tax on our profession, he's got my vote.

[Piled Higher and Deeper]

AllSeeingEye & Dennis,

The patent bar exam and scientific/technical requirements are a weak barrier to entry and even weaker preparation for practice, as anyone who has taken it and gone on to practice patent prosecution can attest.

For biotech/pharma, the requirments are far from sufficient to ensure that a registered practitioner is capable of understanting the technology or is qualified to practice. I have a freshly minted patent agent with a BS degree in biology and the minimum number of hours in chemistry alone to practice. He wants to be a patent attorney. I gave him a simple office action and asked him to analyze two allegedly anticipatory references (patents of less than 10 pgs each). I explained that the entire response, including reporting it to the client, anlayzing the art and preparing the response and amendment should take no more than 8 hours. I spend about 45 min explaining how he should approach the problem. After 3 days he announced that it was too complicated. Granted, it was his first OA, but he's now thinking about a career in trademarks.

[Ludwig Van]

If the Allseeing was worth his shingle, he'd have noticed that Malcolm Mooney just outed himself...

It's the moloko plus and the synthmesc, grok?

See yas down the Korova, malchicks.

[Alan McDonald]

The rational of culling persons from the roster is garbage.

The PTO has forever sent letters to all practitioners on a rotating basis and removed them from the roster if they did not respond (charging a fee for reinstatement if someone forgot to respond). I believe it was alphabetical and on a 5 year rotation. The assumption was if you didn't respond you either didn't want to practice anymore or you had died. NO FEE was required to respond.

I'd get a kick reading the PTO Gazette and seeing the list including well-known attorneys who had their PTO registrations revoked, at least temporarily, for forgetting to respond to these letters. Then I'd call some of my friends to "remind" them that they were no longer registered.

[Hokie]

I wouldn't mind a PTO CLE requirement *at all* if I could also get state credit for it, particularly ethics credit. The current alternative is a couple hours of online lecturing about real estate ethics or general litigation ethics, which aren't very useful or interesting--this is a real opportunity for win/win, PTO, why don't you do the right thing for once and help practitioners instead of trying to stick it to us?

[accounting department]

does anyone know if this will be invoiced or is there simply some affirmative duty to send it in?

[Maurice Levy, Esq.]

My monthly electric bill is higher than that. I think I'll be able to swing it. As bureaucratic hassles go, this one barely registers.

[Les]

Maurice -

You should probably turn off a few lights. This is an outrageous tax, and it will go up.

They say they need the money to maintain a roster, including discipline.

They have been maintaining a roster for quite a while now, and have managed to do it without this fee. Its available on line. You can even search it by partial zip code.

Is the office saying that the Office of Enrollment and Discipline hasn't been doing its job since its inception because it hasn't had the required funds?

The Office says that the 118 bux is less that 1/7 of one percent of the "average" practitioner's income and there for insignificant. To that I say, what percentage of the PTO's total income will the collected fees be? What percentage of the U.S. Governments income will it be? Talk about insignificant.

So long Dudas.

[Roger Karp]

Hokie,

I believe it will be up to each state's CLE governing body to evaluate and determine whether or not to give state CLE credit and how much credit for the likely USPTO CLE.

[fighting]

STOP THE FIGHTING...
being a bit of student of social interactions between the PTO and practitioners as I think we all become with enough time... It really comes down to every time enough patent attorneys get together and complain, Examiners and the Office get together and come up with some set of punitive rules directed against attorneys (call it the patent union of sorts). Examiner's basically enjoy a SUPER-union and we all know what that has done for GM's competitiveness.
Examiner's are allowed to do whatever they want to up to and including intentionally not returning phone calls and simply making it impossible to get a novel, non-obvious set of claims allowed. While Examiner's enjoy this untouchable status, attorneys are out there working within a set of rules to avoid malpractice (see other recent post on this blog).
I don't think this is a large amount to pay, but I think there is a correlation between complaints about the office and protectionist/punitive policies established by the office.

[justathought]

My question is why do patent practitioners have to pay to practice before a govt agency, when those practicing before the FDA, EPA,IRS, etc., have no such fee requirement? Just shows how little respect the patent practitioners and their clients are given at the USPTO.

[Babel Boy]

The rule is likely illegal as being based on a public notice that is 5 years old. It's also discriminatory. Are lawyers who practice before the US federal courts charged dues? How about bankruptcy lawyers? OK, so who's gonna' step forward and challenge it? GSK?

BTW, all of you registered practitioners who are constantly dissing and demeaning the USPTO, your comments show unmitigated disrespect for the PTO managers (even if they are dickheads) and for the law. Such comments are clearly punishable by disciplinary action. Harry Moatz is going to force Dennis to reveal who you are, because if Dennis refuses to comply then THAT represents disrespect for the law. Once he has your names, Moatz is going to cancel your registration, thereby saving you $118 per year.

Fear not. Obama is hiring. Go to Change.gov and fill out an online application.

[broje]

What I want to know is whether the USPTO will allow us to pay several years in advance, or what their procedure will be for handling overpayments.

[xtexan]

This is another slap in the face from the PTO.

Obviously, the USPTO has been offering the mailing list of all practitioners for sale to advertisers for some time. There is not, nor has there ever been, a way to shield one's private information from advertisers. And every practiccioner is faced with an unstoppable barrage of direct mail spam.

Now, on top of that, they are charging us money to retain our registration?

[Leopold Bloom]

"What I want to know is whether the USPTO will allow us to pay several years in advance, or what their procedure will be for handling overpayments."

I'll tell you what, broje - Send me the fee for, say, 10 years, care of Dennis, and I'll take care of it for you. Write the check for $1180, made payable to "Leopold Bloom."

[broje]

"I'll tell you what, broje - Send me the fee for, say, 10 years, care of Dennis, and I'll take care of it for you. Write the check for $1180, made payable to 'Leopold Bloom.'"

Good one. I'm just trying to figure out what to do at the end of the billing year, when it's time to "use or lose" the remainder of my business development account.

[No One in Particular]

Patent Attorneys (and Agents) don't pay fees.

They collect them from their clients.

[bierbelly]

"The true motivation probably is to allow Harry Moatz to fund a new wave of disciplinary proceedings against practitioners, probably arising from IDS filings of references that the practitioner did not read before filing."
------------------------------------------------

I agree with Yossarian. Would somebody PLEASE take Harry out for drinks and introduce him to Monica Lewinsky?

[Bad Joke Ahead]

Oh to be average. Ha ha ha.

I dream of one day being "average".

[obedient practitioner]

To reiterate "accounting department's" comment, does anyone know if this will be invoiced or is there simply some affirmative duty to send it in?

[M. Slonecker]

As best I can determine, this "fee" is needed so that the USPTO can hire staff to administer the "fee process".

I do have to wonder if anyone has filed a FOIA request directed to the purported "admin costs" associated with keeping names on file in electronic format? For example, if it costs $25 in admin support to change one's status to inactive, I have to wonder what is the cost in admin support to make no change whatsoever?

BTW, has Title 35 been amended recently by Congress to authorize the imposition of this "fee"?

[Bonzo]

Have you all missed it?

These rules are Dudas & Co's parting shot at the patent bar that squelched his rules package. Our friends Tafas and GSK raised so much hell on our behalf that they had to snipe in some fashion, and this is it.

[rule junkie]

"To reiterate "accounting department's" comment, does anyone know if this will be invoiced or is there simply some affirmative duty to send it in?"

From 11.8(d):
"Adequate notice shall be published and sent to practitioners in advance of the due date for payment of the annual practitioner maintenance fee. Payment shall be for the fiscal year in which the annual practitioner maintenance fee is assessed. Payment shall be due by the last day of the payment period."

[Leopold Bloom]

"To reiterate 'accounting department's' comment, does anyone know if this will be invoiced or is there simply some affirmative duty to send it in?"

According to the PTO's announcement: "Adequate notice will be published and sent to practitioners in advance of the due date for payment of the fee."

You might want to make sure your address is current with the PTO.

[Leopold Bloom]

And Dennis, did AIPLA really say that they were "conceptionally … not opposed ..."? What does "conceptionally" mean?

[Dennis]

In regards sending a bill....

37 CFR 11.8(d) now states in pertinent part "[a]dequate notice shall be published and sent to practitioners in advance of the due date for payment of the annual practitioner mainenance fee."

I assume this means they send you a bill.

[Leopold Bloom]

"And Dennis, did AIPLA really say that they were
'conceptionally … not opposed ...'?"

Sigh. I googled it, and they did.

[Tourbillon]

If the PTO were truly interested in protecting the public, it would cease breeding intransigence into its examiners. "Just say no" is not an index of quality.

If the PTO were truly interested in preserving the integrity of the Office, it wouldn't use risible alibis for its greedy hand that only fellow bureaucrats would believe.

If the PTO truly wanted to maintain high professional standards, it would stop hiring imbeciles who can't seem to understand fundamental technical principles and who can't articulate their misunderstanding in anything resembling comprehensible English.

It has become painfully embarrassing acting as de facto Office emissary to American inventors, who howl in derision at the technical absurdity and illiteracy of most office actions. Until, that is, they've been through the sausage mill a few times, at which point they become numbly cynical and, thus, fit for civil service or patent practice.

[PatentAgent_turned_2100Examiner]

The Office citing the AIPLA statistics was like throwing salt in a wound. There are a bunch of us registered Patent Practitioners that don't make nearly those kind of annual salaries. i.e. Those of us who are currently PTO Examiners getting paid at lower GS salary!!!

[Blair Hughes]

There is a scintella of merit to the public protection aspect of the rule. It protects the joe sixpack inventor from the person with an "active" registration number who has not drafted or prosecuted a patent application in ten years and who is not up to date on the current rules. This person would return the letter confirming their registration but might not fork out $118 to keep his registration active.

[Steve Morsa]

"Only" $118?

...and the federal income tax was 1% when first enacted...on the highest (rich) folks only.

[PhilS]

I participated in the USPTO's beta testing of their online CLE which worked well, although I did not always agree with the content or "correct answers." Even though I did not completely agree with the CLE, it did provide some insight into what the PTO considered important. Whether the info translates into anything useful, only time will tell.

In truth I see the fee as just another tax on the "framed paper" hanging on my wall.

[Malcolm Mooney]

I do think the PTO needs to pick a couple ripe, plump examples of the submission of garbage claims accompanied by a worthless oath and take Rule 56 all the way to the end zone, i.e., banned for life or some substantial fraction of it.

That would stop the worst nonsense.

Then again, so will a couple more Bilski's.

[AllSeeingEye]

I think Bonzo hit it. The fee is Dudas' way of flipping off the patent bar. Perhaps he already knows that his remaining gigs will forever be outside the patent sphere. After cooling off a bit, I pondered the significance (and sheer arbitrary-ness) of linking the $118 dollar amount to the rule number and asked myself if this was some kind of joke vis-a-vis Sports Illustrated's notorious Sid Finch April Fool article. Then I had a vision of Dudas riding off into the sunset with a smirk.

Perhaps we can have the last laugh by petitioning to have his picture removed from the hall of inventors.

Did someone say Mooney was "outed?" I wondered about that white wine thing.

[AllSeeingEye]

To Piled Higher and Deeper (PhD),

I guess you've actually hit another nail that I wanted to pound, which is that, notwithstanding the educational and examination requirements, which I would still argue are not insignificant, to really practice at a level to make $400+ an hour takes a lot of work and experience. PhD essentially proves the point that not everyone, even those who can meet the basic requirements and pass an exam are fit to practice.

Those that can are worth every penny IMO.

[broje]

"The Office citing the AIPLA statistics was like throwing salt in a wound. There are a bunch of us registered Patent Practitioners that don't make nearly those kind of annual salaries. i.e. Those of us who are currently PTO Examiners getting paid at lower GS salary!!!"

I read the whole rule. If I understood correctly, USPTO employees are made inactive and and don't pay $118. I wasn't really paying attention to that part, but I think they either pay $25 or they pay nothing.

Still, those AIPLA stats do not really reflect what the "typical" practitioner is making. For example, the "average" for partners fails to account for the fact that a few billing partners are making millions, while their associates are doing all the work. Meanwhile, about 250K is probably more typical partner income. More attention should be given to the standard deviation and the mean. Then some acknowledgemnt should be made that those working in lower cost living areas are more heavily burdened. Still, $118 seems trivial. It will be more of an issue when they quadruple that figure in five years.

[Larry Kasoff]

The USPTO finally put up a notice on their site about the annual practitioner maintenance fee. It is available at: http://www.uspto.gov/main/homepagenews/2008nov18.htm

Apparently, while the rule is effective on December 17, 2008, the fee is not actually due until the Spring of 2009 and we will receive an invoice for the fee. It appears that we will also be able to pay the fee online.

[patent_type]

How did they calculate $118? Is that an arbitrary and capricious exercise of administrative power?

[Rich Goldstein]

The entire argument of the OED is based upon their notion that this fee should be welcomed by the Patent Bar, because it is in the interests of the Patent Bar to make sure that the OED is well funded so that they can uphold the integrity of the patent bar.

One needs to remember that the OED is not the patent bar.

Most bar organizations are made up of members of the bar who seek to uphold the values of the profession by giving their time to regulate the other members.

In sharp contrast, the OED is an office of the federal government, staffed by federal employees who have no vested interest in the profession itself.

There is some real need for reform here, before the OED goes too off on its own political tangent which is NOT in the best interests of the patent bar.

It is also time that the AIPLA stood up to the OED on behalf of the Patent Bar!