Steps When Confronted with an Assignment Against Your Property Filed by Another Party

Best approach:

1. Contact the party that improperly filed the assignment against your property.  Ask them to file a corrective assignment with the Assignment Recordation Branch (Assignment Branch).

2. If the corrective assignment is filed and recorded, the Assignment Branch will record the assignment against the correct property and remove any pointers from your property to the previously recorded incorrect assignment document.  [The assignment will remain at the reel and frame where it was recorded originally but when one searches your property the assignment will not be associated with your property.]

If the party that originally recorded the document will not file the corrective assignment or that party cannot be found:

1. You may file a document with the Office of the Deputy Commissioner for Trademark Examination Policy requesting that the pointers to your property be removed.  This request can be faxed to 571-273-8950.  

NOTE:  This will only be granted if the current evidence of record clearly demonstrates that the assignment recorded against your property was the result of a typographical error in identifying the property and no proper chain of title exists to the party who filed the assignment against your property. 

This request will not be granted if there is a dispute regarding ownership.

OR

2. You must record your own paperwork with the Assignment Branch to correct the record.  In this case, you must do the following:

      a. File a complete cover sheet for recordation.  With the cover sheet you must include a supporting declaration or affidavit from someone with firsthand knowledge of the facts stating why the previously recorded document should not be considered against your property and pay the required recordation filing fee of $40.

               i. On the cover sheet, identify the true owner of the property in both the assignee and assignor fields; and

               ii. On the cover sheet, identify in the “nature of conveyance” field that you are filing a “Corrective assignment to correct the previously recorded assignment against ^ (Property number) recorded at ^ (reel frame).

Note: This will not remove the previously recorded document from being associated with your property, but anyone looking at the assignment records will see the clear chain of title.

Updating the Trademark databases-TRAM and TSDR

Finally, if the ownership information has been incorrectly changed in the USPTO electronic database due to the assignment filed by another, you should send a written request to the USPTO to have the records changed back to the last listed owner who had a clear chain of title in the property. This request can be submitted by sending an e-mail to TMFeedback@uspto.gov.

NOTE:  While taking the step of e-mailing TMFeedback@uspto.gov may change the ownership records in the USPTO databases, this will not remove the records that are currently recorded against the property with the Assignment Recordation Branch.   For actual removal, you must do the steps outlined in the earlier sections, above.