All business with the Patent and Trademark Office should be transacted in writing. The personal attendance of applicants or their attorneys or agents at the Patent and Trademark Office is unnecessary. The action of the Patent and Trademark Office will be based exclusively on the written record in the Office. No attention will be paid to any alleged oral promise, stipulation, or understanding in relation to which there is disagreement or doubt.

§ 1.3 Business to be conducted with decorum and courtesy.

Applicants and their attorneys or agents are required to conduct their business with the Patent and Trademark Office with decorum and courtesy. Papers presented in violation of this requirement will be submitted to the Commissioner and will be returned by his direct order. Complaints against examiners and other employees must be made in communications separate from other papers. § 1.4

Nature of correspondence.

(a) Correspondence with the Patent and Trademark Office comprises (1) correspondence relating to services and facilities of the Office, such as general inquiries, requests for publications supplied by the Office, orders for printed copies of patents or trademark registrations, orders for copies of records, transmission of assignments for recording, and the like, and (2) correspondence in and relating to a particular application or other proceeding in the Office. See particularly the rules relating to the filing and prosecution of applications or other

proceedings (§§ 1.31 to 1.352 and §§ 2.11 to 2.189).

(b) Since each application file should be complete in itself, a separate copy of every paper to be filed in an application should be furnished for each application to which the paper pertains, even though the contents of the papers filed in two or more applications may be identical.

(c) Since different matters may be considered by different branches or sections of the Patent and Trademark Office, each distinct subject, inquiry or order should be contained in a separate letter to avoid confusion and delay in answering letters dealing with different subjects.

§ 1.5

Identification of application, patent or registration.

(a) When a letter concerns an application for patent, it should state the name of the applicant, the title of the invention, the serial number of the application, the date of filing the same, and, if known, the group art unit and name of the examiner to which it has been assigned (see § 1.55).

(b) When the letter concerns a patent, it should state the number and date of issue of the patent, the name of the patentee, and the title of the invention.

(c) A letter relating to a trademark application should identify it as such and by the name of the applicant and the serial number and filing date of the application. A letter relating to a registered trademark should identify it by the name of the registrant and by the number and date of the certificate.

[24 F.R. 10332, Dec. 22, 1959, as amended at 34 F.R. 18857, Nov. 26, 1969]

§ 1.6

Receipt of letters and papers.

(a) Letters and other papers received in the Patent and Trademark Office are stamped with the date of receipt. No papers are received in the Patent and Trademark Office on Saturdays, Sundays or holidays within the District of Columbia.

(b) Mail placed in the Patent and Trademark Office pouch up to midnight on weekdays, excepting Saturdays and holidays, by the post office at Washington, D.C., serving the Patent and Trademark Office, is considered as having been received in the Patent and Trademark Office on the day it was so placed in the pouch.