4.3 Filing European patent applications
4.3.4Applications filed with national authorities and forwarded to the EPO
4.3.008When you file a European patent application on paper with a national authority, the national authority issues the receipt for documents (page 9 of the request for grant). After checking the application for security or for other national requirements, it then forwards it to the EPO. The EPO then notifies you accordingly, indicating the date of receipt at the EPO, by sending you a copy of the receipt for documents (page 9 of the request for grant).
You are also sent an acknowledgement of receipt from the national authority concerned if you file European patent applications electronically with any of the national authorities that so permit. If you do not receive this acknowledgement, please contact the national authority.
If the national authority withholds your European application on account of the above-mentioned national requirements, you may pursue it as a national application.
4.3.009In the very rare event that your application fails to reach the EPO before the end of the fourteenth month after filing or after the earliest priority date, it is deemed to be withdrawn, and any fees that you have paid are refunded. The EPO notifies you accordingly, and you can then convert your European patent application into a national application.
You must file the request for conversion with the central industrial property office of the contracting state in which you filed the application, and you must do so within three months after receiving notification from the EPO. For more details see National law relating to the EPC (see point 2.1.004).