Fraudulent Invoices in IP Matters – Criminals in Germany sentenced to 22 months in prison on probation

If you are the owner of a registered patent, trademark or design (IP rights), you have surely received communication in the past that looked like it was an invoice coming from an official source, that mentioned the correct registration number of your IP right and that made you assume that you needed to pay this invoice to uphold your IP right. NEVER pay such “invoice” unless you have made sure that it is genuine.

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(Source: Shutterstock Photo ID 2162707613)

Background

As IP attorneys, we regularly receive emails from clients forwarding letters that they received by mail asking us whether or not those letters are genuine and what they need to do.

Usually, if you register an IP right through patent attorneys or lawyers, the law firm will take care of all administrative measures that are necessary to uphold your rights. The firm will, in particular, monitor the renewal deadline for the IP right and remind you well in advance that and when payment is due. Any official reminder sent by an Intellectual Property Office will be sent to the registered representative of your IP right, but not to you as the owner.

If you directly receive communication and it looks like an invoice, it usually is spam and only intended to rip you off. Somebody not officially associated with an Intellectual Property Office is sending you the letter “offering” to renew your IP right, but the wording of the “offer” is so small that it is overlooked and people get the impression from the overall look of the letter, that it is an invoice that must be paid to avoid the expiry of a patent, trademark or design.

Upon receipt of such letter, a lot of people simply pay. And they pay a lot more than actually needed or they pay for services absolutely unnecessary.

Overall, these misleading invoices are very annoying and the Intellectual Property Offices have been warning about them for a long time.

Recent Decision By German Criminal Court

Recently, the European Union Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO) published information on its website about a German court decision issued in September 2024. The criminal court in Munich – based on a criminal complaint for suspected fraud filed by the EUIPO in December 2020 – found three defendants guilty of commercial gang fraud for sending misleading invoices to EUIPO customers. Each of the defendants was sentenced to 22 months' imprisonment, suspended on probation for three years. In addition, the court confiscated an amount of approximately EUR 200,000 which the defendants had unlawfully obtained with their “invoices”.

According to information from the EUIPO, this was only the second time that misleading invoices were deemed a criminal offence and were qualified as fraud by a criminal court in an EU Member State. The only other decision had been taken in Sweden in 2017 where the defendants were convicted of gross fraud.

Recommended Behavior

Based on the information above and to not become a victim of fraud, we strongly recommend that you do not pay any “invoice” that you receive in an IP matter unless you have clarified with the Intellectual Property Office or with an IP attorney that the invoice is genuine. For an initial check, you can refer to the list of scam letters and emails published by the EUIPO on the misleading invoices section on its website.

Should you have any questions or if you would like to know if an “invoice” that you received is genuine and should be paid to avoid the expiry of your IP right, you are welcome to contact us by email at

or by phone at 089 55 879 870.