Domestic enterprises can entrust an agency with trademark agency qualification to apply for trademark registration, or they can apply directly in the lobby on the first floor of the Trademark Office. Correspondingly, the issuance of the Trademark Registration Certificate is also a "two-legged walk": if a trademark agency applies for registration, the Trademark Registration Certificate will be mailed to all agencies by the Trademark Office; If an enterprise directly applies for registration, the Trademark Registration Certificate will be collected by the registrant at the issuing window of the Trademark Hall on the first floor of the Trademark Office. The reason why the Trademark Registration Certificate directly applied by the enterprise should be distributed in the window instead of mailing it according to the address of the trademark registrant is that the Trademark Registration Certificate is an important certificate to prove the registered trademark right, and once it is damaged, lost or posted incorrectly in the mailing process, it will bring incalculable losses to the registrant. After formal examination and substantive examination, the new trademark application conforms to the provisions of the Trademark Law, then the preliminary examination number and the preliminary examination announcement period shall be determined. Three months after the announcement of preliminary examination, when the objection expires and no one raises any objection, the trademark shall be registered as scheduled, and shall have the effect of registration from the date of registration announcement. However, the Trademark Registration Certificate is not issued immediately after the publication of the registration announcement. Because the objection application filed by the objector on the day when the objection expires is also a valid application, the Trademark Office should also accept it. Objections can submit their applications directly to the Trademark Office or by post. According to Article 46 of the Detailed Rules for the Implementation of the Trademark Law: "If documents are sent or received by post, the postmark date shall prevail; If the postmark is unclear or there is no postmark, the date of receipt or dispatch by the parties concerned shall be 2 days after the Trademark Office issued the document or 2 days before the receipt. Therefore, 2 days after the registration announcement, it can be confirmed that no objector has raised any objection, and the Trademark Registration Certificate can be issued to the registrant. Procedures required for a registrant to directly receive the Trademark Registration Certificate
Generally, the documents required for a trademark registrant to directly receive the Trademark Registration Certificate from the lobby window on the first floor of the Trademark Office are: Notice of Receiving the Trademark Registration Certificate issued by the Trademark Office, letter of introduction from the enterprise, and ID card of the witness and its copy. The Notice of Obtaining a Trademark Registration Certificate was mailed by the Trademark Office to the trademark registrant 2 days after the date of trademark registration. However, sometimes the trademark registrant fails to receive the Notice of Obtaining the Trademark Registration Certificate, which may be due to various reasons. For example, according to the relevant regulations, the name and address of the trademark registrant filled in by the trademark registration applicant in the Application for Trademark Registration must be consistent with the name and address of the enterprise approved or registered in the applicant's business license (which is also one of the contents of the formal examination of the trademark registration application), but many enterprises' registered addresses are inconsistent with their actual office addresses when applying for trademark registration, and their registered addresses have long been abandoned, so the Notice of Obtaining a Trademark Registration Certificate issued according to this address can naturally not be delivered. Other enterprises have changed their address after applying for trademark registration, and the Notice of Obtaining a Trademark Registration Certificate mailed from the original address may be returned by the post office. Although the Notice of Obtaining the Trademark Registration Certificate has not been received, enterprises can still obtain the Trademark Registration Certificate in the lobby on the first floor of the Trademark Office by inquiring about the Trademark Announcement or after-the-fact inquiry in the Trademark Office, but the required documents are different. In the absence of the Notice of Obtaining a Trademark Registration Certificate, the registrant should not only submit the letter of introduction, identity card and its copy, but also produce a copy of the business license of the enterprise that has been inspected in the current year when receiving the Trademark Registration Certificate. The business license must be a copy, not a copy, and it should be inspected in the same year, so as to prove that its enterprise is still legally existing and operating effectively. For example, an enterprise obtained the Trademark Registration Certificate with a copy of its business license that had not been inspected for two years. After investigation, the enterprise was cancelled one year ago. The registrant no longer exists, and the trademark right can only be eliminated with the loss of its subject. The legal effect of the Trademark Registration Certificate
The Trademark Registration Certificate is a legal document issued by the Trademark Office to a trademark registrant in accordance with the relevant provisions of the Trademark Law to prove the scope of its exclusive right to use a trademark. The main contents recorded in the Trademark Registration Certificate include: trademark (pattern), trademark registration number, name and address of the trademark registrant, goods or services approved for use by the registered trademark and their categories, and the start and end dates (validity period) of the exclusive right to use the trademark. If faced with such a complete Trademark Registration Certificate, there is no trace of alteration or damage, and it is still within the validity period recorded in the registration certificate (we emphasize that the Trademark Registration Certificate was indeed issued by the Trademark Office), will you have doubts about its legal effect? Most people will think that the contents recorded in such a registration certificate are undoubtedly consistent with the actual situation of the trademark. However, in fact, this is not necessarily the case. Perhaps the registered trademark has changed hands long ago, or it may be invalid because it has been cancelled or revoked. Therefore, it is necessary for us to study the current Trademark Law and its Implementing Regulations. According to the current Trademark Law and its Implementing Regulations, when the Trademark Office issues a trademark registration certificate for the first time, there will be two situations: one is that all the information recorded in the registration certificate is exactly the same as the current actual situation of the trademark; The other is that the owner and related information of the trademark are different from those recorded in the registration certificate when the certificate is issued. The reason for the second situation is that the revised Trademark Law gives the applicant the right to transfer or change at the application stage (that is, it has not been approved for registration). If the trademark in the application stage is changed or transferred, there will also be two situations: if the application for change or transfer is approved before the issuance of the trademark registration certificate, the issued registration certificate records the relevant residence of the changed or transferee; If the application for change or transfer is not approved before the issuance of the trademark registration certificate, the information of the original applicant will be recorded on the issued registration certificate, even though the owner of the registered trademark has changed at this time (the Trademark Office will issue a certificate of change or transfer later, which will be used together with the original registration certificate). For the transfer and change of a trademark after registration, the Trademark Law and its Implementing Regulations do not stipulate that the original registration certificate should be withdrawn and replaced with a new one, but only a certificate of change or transfer will be issued after approval, which will be used together with the original registration certificate. This situation shows that the registration certificate alone cannot show the true legal status of the registered trademark. The period of validity of a registered trademark is ten years. If it is necessary to continue to use it after the expiration, it shall apply for renewal of registration six months before the expiration or within the extended period. The renewal of a registered trademark is the same as the change and transfer. After the renewal, the registration certificate will not be renewed, but only a certificate will be issued. At this time, the Trademark Registration Certificate seems to have expired, but in fact it is not. The original registration certificate and the newly issued renewal certificate both indicate that the registered trademark is still in a valid legal state. If an application for renewal has not been filed at the expiration of the extension period, the Trademark Office shall cancel the registered trademark. In this case, the Trademark Law and its Implementing Regulations also do not stipulate that the original registration certificate should be withdrawn. After the expiration of the validity period of the same registered trademark, whether it is renewed or not, the contents of its registration certificate itself are the same, which is beyond its validity period. However, in fact, there are two completely different legal states, one is a valid registered trademark, and the other is invalid due to overdue cancellation. There are only two references in the Trademark Law and its Implementing Regulations: Article 46 of the Implementing Regulations states, "Where a trademark registrant applies for cancellation of its registered trademark or the registration of its trademark on some designated goods, it shall submit an application for cancellation of the trademark to the Trademark Office and return the original Trademark Registration Certificate." Article 38 of the Implementation Regulations states, "If the Trademark Registration Certificate is lost or damaged, it shall apply to the Trademark Office for a replacement. If the Trademark Registration Certificate is lost, a statement of loss shall be published in the Trademark Announcement. The damaged Trademark Registration Certificate shall be returned to the Trademark Office when the application for replacement is submitted. " In other cases, such as revocation, improper cancellation of registration, cancellation without renewal at the expiration of the validity period, and cancellation without handling the transfer formalities within one year from the date of death or termination of a trademark registrant, the Trademark Law and its Implementation Regulations do not stipulate that the registration certificate should be returned. Even if the above two situations require the return of the registration certificate, there is no provision on what legal consequences will be caused if the registration certificate is not returned. Therefore, the actual situation is that many registrants do not return their registration certificates when going through relevant procedures, resulting in a large number of invalid registration certificates in society. The Trademark Law stipulates that the exclusive right to use a registered trademark is limited to the goods/services approved by the registered trademark. But many people's understanding of what is an approved registered trademark is not necessarily accurate. When an applicant submits an application for trademark registration, sometimes there are parts in the trademark pattern that cannot be used exclusively. For example, if "Nestle Coffee" is used as a trademark on coffee, the word "coffee" cannot be used exclusively. For these parts that cannot be used exclusively, the Trademark Law allows them to be kept as part of the whole trademark. The Trademark Office will regard it as an automatic waiver of the exclusive right when reviewing, but there will be no relevant mark on the registration certificate. In this case, the registrant cannot claim the exclusive right of the word "coffee" on the grounds that the trademark is a registered trademark. Of course, this is just a simple example. Most people will not make such mistakes, but in practice they will encounter many situations that are not so obvious. This example is given to illustrate that the expression of the registration certificate alone cannot explain the true legal status of the trademark. In the course of business operation, due to the incomplete understanding of trademark law, enterprises often can't correctly understand the legal effect of the Trademark Registration Certificate, and many people are deceived only by looking at a registration certificate. In the course of business operation, when one party takes a registered trademark as some kind of proof, or shares as intangible assets, the other party must not think that the trademark right is true and effective only by the other party's Trademark Registration Certificate. The Trademark Office shall, in accordance with the Trademark Law, set up a Trademark Registration Book to record registered trademarks and related registration matters. Enterprises should first inquire about the trademark register of the Trademark Office to understand its real legal status, and then make a decision. Similarly, in the process of law enforcement, the trademark administrative law enforcement department should first find out the true legal status of the trademark involved, and should not make a hasty decision based on a Trademark Registration Certificate. Although the Trademark Registration Certificate itself may not show the true legal status of the said trademark, as a certificate issued by the state administrative organ, anyone who forges or alters the Trademark Registration Certificate will still be investigated for criminal responsibility according to the provisions of the Criminal Law on the crime of forging or altering the certificate of the state organ or other crimes. This point, enterprises should pay attention to in the process of operation. In particular, some small and medium-sized enterprises should pay attention to it. They should not blindly believe the contents recorded in the Trademark Registration Certificate, nor treat them as trifles. Problems needing attention in practice
(1) Enterprises should fill in the address truthfully and pay attention to the Trademark Announcement in order to exercise their trademark rights in time. When applying for a registered trademark, an enterprise shall ensure that the registered address of a copy of its business license is its real and effective office address. If not, it shall change the address on its business license as much as possible. Because this address is the only address of the trademark application in the registration process, if the address is wrong, it will bring unnecessary trouble to the subsequent issuance of the Notice of Correction, the Review Opinion and the Trademark Registration Certificate. Similarly, if an enterprise changes its address after submitting an application for trademark registration, it will be troubled that it will not receive the Notice of Obtaining a Trademark Registration Certificate. In order to confirm whether its trademark rights have been recognized and protected by law, registrants can always refer to the Trademark Announcement, or they can go to Tongda Trademark Service Center for free inquiry after submitting an application for trademark registration for one and a half years, so as to know whether their trademark is registered. Enterprises that have not received the Notice of Obtaining a Trademark Registration Certificate, but have learned that their trademarks have been approved for registration through the above channels, should also pay attention to the fact that they cannot obtain the certificates immediately after the publication of the trademark registration announcement, and should be delayed for 2 days. To avoid running around in vain. (two) the ownership of the Trademark Registration Certificate after the applicant for trademark registration submitted the application for trademark registration, the enterprise restructuring or the main body changed. The contemporary economic situation is complicated, and enterprises are also facing various possible changes. In the more than one year from the application to the final obtaining of the Trademark Registration Certificate, the nature of the enterprise may change, such as the restructuring of state-owned enterprises into joint-stock enterprises, collective enterprises or other enterprises with economic nature; It is also possible that the main body of an enterprise is merged or divided, such as the original enterprise is divided into two or more new enterprises, or the original enterprise is merged by other enterprises. At this time, the new enterprise is completely different from the old enterprise. Although a new enterprise may inherit the trademark rights and obligations of the old enterprise in accordance with the law, it still cannot directly obtain the Trademark Registration Certificate for the old enterprise. The enterprise can go through the trademark transfer formalities with the relevant materials. After the transfer is approved, the transferee will take the trademark office transfer certificate and other identification documents to the trademark office window to receive the registration certificate. If an enterprise changes its name after submitting an application for trademark registration, but it does not involve changes in the nature and subject of the enterprise, the enterprise can present other required documents together with the certificate of change issued by the administrative department for industry and commerce, and then go through the formalities of obtaining the Trademark Registration Certificate. (3) Foreigners who want to obtain a registration certificate can only entrust an agency to act as their agent. We have encountered such an example. A Hainan enterprise directly applied to the Trademark Office for trademark registration. After being registered, it was delayed to receive the Trademark Registration Certificate for various reasons. Later, the enterprise transferred the trademark to an American. After the transfer was approved, the American entrusted a China citizen to collect the Trademark Registration Certificate with the transfer certificate, but we were told that it could not be obtained. According to the second paragraph of Article 3 of the Detailed Rules for the Implementation of the Trademark Law, when foreigners or foreign enterprises apply for trademark registration or handle other trademark matters in China, they shall entrust a trademark agency designated by the State Administration for Industry and Commerce. The China citizen has no trademark agency qualification, so he can't engage in trademark agency affairs and can't represent foreign registrants to receive the Trademark Registration Certificate. If the registrant wants to get the Trademark Registration Certificate, he can only entrust a trademark agency to act as an agent.