Examination of the application

Processing time

According to PRV's service commitment, i.e. what we promise you as a customer, a first technical notice must be sent from us no later than 9 months from the date of filing, i.e. the date you filed your national application. It very rarely takes nine months. Currently it takes about seven months from the date of filing until you will receive the first technical notice. It is worth noting that the technical examination will not start before four months, as we wait for the databases which we use for search to be updated. Furthermore, the number of applications and the distribution of the applications within the different technology areas will also affect our delivery times.

In the third quarter of 2023, the average waiting times for a first notice were:

• Mechanical Engineering: 8 months
• Electrical Engineering: 6,5 months
• Chemical and Biological Engineering: 7 months

Approximately three-quarters of the patent applications received by PRV will receive a final decision within two years of the filing date. It is rare that you must wait more than three years, but it does happen if, for example, your application needs a lot of amendments. If you submit amendments and new documents, you will hear from us no later than twelve months from the date we received the submitted response. However, you will usually hear from us sooner than that. The average delivery time for a further technical notice is currently about seven months but is also dependent on the technical area your application falls within.

In the third quarter of 2023, the average wait times for another technical notice were:

• Mechanical engineering: 8 months
• Electrical Engineering: 5 months
• Chemical and Biological Engineering: 7,5 months