Fees Increases for Federal Trademark Filings
Starting in November 2024 and continuing through 2025, the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) will begin implementing fee increases for trademark applications and maintenance filings. The purpose of the fee increase is to help cover the USPTO’s future operational costs and to fund improvements in technology. The increase in fees is also meant to protect the integrity of the register by deterring broad filings by foreign trademark owners.
Trademark Applications
One of the notable changes is to have only one type of base application. Applicants will be forced to use the USPTO standard descriptions of goods/services. If an Applicant wishes to submit its own description, the cost will be an additional $200 per class on top of the $350 standard fee per class. Additional fees will apply for descriptions of goods/services consisting of more than 1,000 characters or if an Applicant provides insufficient information regarding the goods/services. In some cases, the USPTO filing fees will be double the previous fees.
For applications filed on an intent-to-use basis, the USPTO has proposed a 50% increase per class for filing Amendments to Allege Use (AAU) and Statements of Use (SOU).
Finally, the proposed application fee changes also apply to applications filed through the Madrid System.
Post-Registration Maintenance Filings
The USPTO is also proposing some fee increases to the cost of maintaining a trademark registration both at the time of filing a Declaration of Use between the 5th and 6th year and at the time for renewal.
In sum, business owners currently thinking about applying for federal registration of their marks may consider applying before these changes go into effect.
Contact the authors for more detail.
