6. Fee refunds

As a general rule, once a fee has been validly paid it will not be refunded, unless a refund is provided for in the EPC or RFees.

In T 2069/18, the board held that the examining division had rightly found the renewal fees in issue to have been duly incurred and imposed. The refund arrangements laid down in e.g. Art. 9 RFees 1973 to Art. 11 RFees 1973, albeit inapplicable in the case in hand, showed that the EPC 1973 legislator had provided for the possibility of refunds in certain cases. Otherwise too, the EPO regularly refunded payments made without a legal basis of its own accord, on the grounds of equity. Renewal fees which had been duly imposed and paid were not retrospectively deprived of their legal basis because the EPO had been slow to act in examination proceedings. See also T 1284/09.

See also the relevant chapters of the book for decisions on the refund of specific procedural fees.