On 3-5 October 2018, EUIPO welcomed the seventh edition of an external audit on the quality of its opposition decisions on European trademarks.
In accordance with its 2020 Strategic Plan, EUIPO established the goal of enhanced customer-driven quality services. This is a user-oriented approach that focuses on the quality of EUIPO's products and services to achieve this goal. In this context, the Stakeholder Quality Assurance Panels (SQAP) is being consolidated as a project aimed at involving users in the quality management of the Office and Opposition decisions in order to bridge the gap between the users' perception of quality and the internal quality measurement results.
During the two-day meeting, 19 auditors representing twelve User Associations studied EUIPO opposition decisions to check quality in accordance with the established Office criteria (Regulation, Guidelines, Practice and established case law) together with Opposition Internal Auditors and the Examiners. The studies are conducted on a sample of decisions already checked ex-post and apply the same quality testing methodology. The Federation was represented by Eleni Kokkini and Elia Sugranes who expressed FICPI's thanks for being invited to attend, and underscored the Federation's interest in this project:FICPI has long supported efforts to ensure high quality decisions. Based on the users associations' input, the EUIPO takes actions to improve the quality of its opposition decisions.
The organization and work done by EUIPO should be applauded and encouraged.
Elia Sugranes & Eleni Kokkini
