Trademark Renewal is a significant process to increase the longevity of a trademark. If you don’t renew your brand after expiration, the Registrar removes it from the trademark registry. However, now and then, circumstances can lead to the failure of trademark renewal. What happens then? Let’s find out.
Trademark registration’s protection isn’t perpetual; it has an expiration date. And when it expires, you must go through trademark renewal to get it back. However, sometimes the circumstances or the lack of documents don’t allow us to renew our trademark in time. What happens then?
What happens if you fail to go through trademark renewal?
The removal of trademark renewal from the trademark registry
The first consequence of failing to renew your trademark is its removal from the trademark registry. The trademark registrar doesn’t wait beyond one month past the expiration date. After your brand’s removal from the register, you cease to hold any right over it.
To fix it, you must consult with an attorney as soon as you hit the expiration date and apply for trademark renewal.
You will receive a notification of your trademarks’ removal from the registry.
Don’t think you will not receive any information before the Registrar removes your brand name from the registry. On the contrary, fifteen days before the Registrar removes you and your brand’s name from the register, you will receive a complete notification. It will entail the intention of the Registrar to erase your brand and his reason behind doing so.
You will lose all the rights to your trademark.
Once the Registrar erases your brand name from the register, you will lose your trademark rights. You will lose your prerogative to use your brand name on your product or services and the right to file trademark infringement cases against others.
However, you will still have a way out.
Even though you have failed to renew your trademark, you still have a way to retain your trademark rights. You do this by following the procedure of trademark restoration. Within six months of your trademark’s expiration, apply to restore it. If your timeline is adequate and you meet all the restoration requirements, the Registrar will give your trademark rights back to you.
Why should you renew your trademark on time?
Don’t take the matter of trademark renewal lightly. While the process is relatively simple, the reason you should always go for renewal instead of restoration are as follows:
- You can lose your trademark: Entrepreneurs watch over the trademark register like a hawk. As soon as one becomes available, they lunge at it to make it their own. When that happens, you won’t get your rights to trademark back. The Registrar will replace you. And once he has replaced your name, getting your brand back is a long battle filled with legal hearings that can take up half your life.
- Restoring a trademark takes time: Unlike trademark renewal, a process that can complete in a week, restoration can take months. The reasons can be that someone else has applied to own your trademark or is opposed to your right to restore it. Whatever the cause, the trademark restoration will take time.
Conclusion
You must restore your trademark within the timeline. Failure to do so might require you to opt for restoration that will take longer and leave your trademark rights to chance.
Thus, when you are near the expiration of your trademark, embark and find a suitable trademark attorney who can restore the trademarking rights on your behalf.
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What happens when you fail to renew your trademark? Read this blog to learn the events that happen if your bid to get trademark renewal ends in failure.
