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§ 704 Receipt; International Filing Date; Signature; Physical Requirements; Subsequent Documents and Correspondence - ADMINISTRATIVE INSTRUCTIONS UNDER THE PCT
§ 704 Receipt; International Filing Date; Signature; Physical Requirements; Subsequent Documents and Correspondence
(a) The receiving Office shall promptly
Numbers of provisions in the Regulations and Administrative Instructions require "prompt" official action. The question of what is "prompt" in given circumstances is not defined in absolute terms but should be explained in the PCT Receiving Office Guidelines. In the context of Section 704(a), the notification should generally issue in minutes rather than hours or days. The various indications referred to in the Section may in some cases have to be notified or confirmed at different times, for example, in the case of batch submissions of documents.
notify the applicant of, or otherwise enable the applicant to obtain confirmation of, the receipt of any purported international application filed with it in electronic form. The notification or confirmation shall indicate or contain:(i) the identity of the Office;
(ii) the date of receipt;
The date of receipt will be determined according to the usual principles applicable to the filing of applications on paper, including filing by electronic means (such as by facsimile transmission), that is, based on the date prevailing at the location of the Office at the time when the complete transmission of the application has been received.
(iii) any reference number or application number assigned to the purported application by the Office; and
(iv) a message digest, generated by the Office, of the purported application as received; and may, at the option of the Office, also indicate or contain other information such as:
(v) the names and sizes of the electronic files received;
(vi) the dates of creation of the electronic files received; and
(vii) a copy of the purported application as received.
(b) Where the receiving Office refuses in accordance with Rule 89bis.1(d) or Section 703(e) to receive a purported international application submitted to it in electronic form, it shall, if practicable having regard to the indications furnished by the applicant,
The receiving Office will, of course, be obliged to act reasonably in deciding what is "practicable" in the circumstances. While a filing date should be accorded wherever it is practicable to do so, it needs to be remembered that receiving Offices are not obliged to receive international applications which do not comply with Annex F (see Section 703(e)). Receiving Offices should not have to go to extreme lengths to find applicants who have not given adequate indications to enable them to be contacted.
promptly notify the applicant accordingly.(c) Promptly after receiving a purported international application in electronic form, the receiving Office shall determine whether the purported application complies with the requirements of Article 11(1) and shall proceed accordingly.
This provision, which repeats the substance of Rule 20.4(a), is included for the guidance of receiving Offices, although it is not strictly necessary in the light of Rules 89bis.1(b).
(d) Where an international application filed in electronic form is not signed in compliance with Section 703(c), the application shall be considered not to comply with the requirements of Article 14(1)(a)(i) and the receiving Office shall proceed accordingly.
(e) Where an international application filed in electronic form does not comply with Section 703(b) but the receiving Office decides, under Section 703(e), to receive it, that non-compliance shall be considered to be non-compliance with the physical requirements referred to in Article 14(1)(a)(v) and the receiving Office shall proceed accordingly, having regard to whether compliance is necessary for the purpose of reasonably uniform international publication (Rule 26.3) and satisfactory electronic communications.
The application of the criteria of "reasonably uniform international publication" and "satisfactory electronic communications" act as a restraint against overly strict enforcement of physical requirements by receiving Offices, similarly to Rule 26.3 which refers to "reasonably uniform international publication" and "satisfactory reproduction" in the case of applications filed on paper.
(f) An international application filed in electronic form may, in accordance with the provisions of Rule 19.4, be transmitted by the Office with which the application was filed to the International Bureau as receiving Office.
This provision is included for the guidance of receiving Offices, although it is not strictly necessary in the light of Rule 89.1(b). A receiving Office might wish to make use of Rule 19.4, for example, where an international application in electronic form is filed in a non-accepted format or by a non-accepted means. In the case referred to in Rule 19.4(a)(iii), the agreement of the Office and the International Bureau, and the authorization of the applicant, would be necessary. Note that the consequences of any non-compliance with national security requirements are a matter for national law and are not governed by either Rule 19.4 or Section 704(f); however, consideration will be given to including mention of such requirements in the PCT Receiving Office Guidelines.
(g) Where an international application filed in electronic form was signed using a type of electronic signature that complies with the basic common standard but that has not been specified by the receiving Office under Section 703(c), the Office may require that any subsequent document or correspondence submitted to it in electronic form be signed using a type of electronic signature that has been so specified.
See Annex F, section 3.3. Under the basic common standard, an international application need only, for the purposes of the according of a filing date, be signed by the applicant using a basic electronic signature and packaged with the digital signature of the sender based on a low-level certificate. Under Section 704(g), the receiving Office, having accorded a filing date to such an application, would be entitled to require that subsequent documents and correspondence be signed by the applicant using a digital signature based on a high-level certificate. If that requirement is not complied with, Rule 92.1(b) and (c) shall apply mutatis mutandis.
If that requirement is not complied with, Rule 92.1(b) and (c) shall apply mutatis mutandis.(h) The provisions of this Part, other than paragraph (g), shall apply mutatis mutandis to other documents and correspondence relating to international applications.
This provision makes it clear that the provisions of Part 7 relating to international applications also apply to other documents and correspondence. It appears to be necessary to include it in addition to Rule 89.2, which has the effect that Rule 89.1 applies to documents other than the international application, since Rule 89.1 is itself an enabling provision. Section 704(g) should not be covered by the provision since it makes special provisions for documents other than the international application.
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