Spotting trademark scams and invented fees

Applications and registrations are public. That openness lets competitors search the register. It also lets private companies send owners letters, emails and calls that look official. Most offer services you do not need. Some demand fees that do not exist. The USPTO describes these practices on its page on misleading notices and scams. In May 2026 it reported eleven administrative orders against filings involving, among other things, filing firms "impersonating the USPTO and inventing trademark registration requirements and filing fees" (USPTO bulletin, May 12, 2026).

How to check any message

1. Look in TSDR. Every official USPTO action on your application or registration appears in the documents tab of TSDR. The USPTO's rule of thumb: "If it's not in TSDR, it's not an official communication."
2. Check the sender. Official USPTO email comes from addresses ending in @uspto.gov. Its websites end in .gov. Names like "Trademark Office," "Patent and Trademark Agency" or "US Trademark Registry," on a non-government address, are not the USPTO.
3. Check the fee. The USPTO charges only the fees on its fee schedule. It does not ask for payment by wire transfer, gift card or cash, or by check sent to a third-party address. There is no USPTO fee for "monitoring," for being listed in a "registry," or for releasing an application to examination.
4. Check the deadline. Maintenance filings fall in fixed windows: between the 5th and 6th year after registration, and in the year before each 10th anniversary (see keeping your registration alive). A notice that something is due years early, or "immediately," is a warning sign.
5. Call the USPTO, not the sender. The Trademark Assistance Center is at 1-800-786-9199. Or use the phone number in the signature block of an Office action you have confirmed in TSDR.

The USPTO also says its employees will never ask for your personal or payment information by phone, email or text. Never share your USPTO.gov password, even with someone helping you file.

Common patterns

• Look-alike invoices for "registration," "publication" or "renewal," often with a fine-print disclaimer that the sender is not a government agency.
• Fake examiner emails that copy a real examining attorney's name and press for immediate payment.
• Spoofed websites and phone numbers made to look like the USPTO.
• Offers to answer an Office action sent to applicants who have just been refused, sometimes from people not authorized to practice.
• Unauthorized changes to the email address on your file, which can redirect official notices. If you receive a notice of a change you did not make, the USPTO asks you to reply to TEAS@uspto.gov and say you did not authorize it.

For Madrid holders

Owners of international registrations receive similar invoices that appear to come from WIPO or an international "register." WIPO warns that "trademark users are receiving invitations to pay fees that do not come from WIPO." It keeps a searchable list of examples (WIPO). WIPO fees are paid to WIPO, normally through its own e-services or through your national office.

What to do

• Do not pay, and do not reply with personal information.
• Report spoofed websites, misused signatures and attorney names used without permission to TMScams@uspto.gov, as the USPTO's page directs.
• If you have already paid, see the USPTO's guidance for scam victims, linked from the same page, and contact your bank.

Not every private message is a scam. Watch services, search firms and law firms offer legitimate work, and some write to owners. The test is simple. A legitimate service tells you plainly that it is not the government, does not invent a deadline, and does not claim that a fee is required by law when it is not.

This guide is general information, not legal advice.