Guide
Patent attorney fees vs IPO fees: two separate bills
Updated
Almost every confusing patent quote is confusing for the same reason: it combines a published official fee with an unpublished professional one and shows you a single number.
The two bills
- Official fees, to the IPO
- Published, fixed, and the same for everyone. Applying online for a filing date only carries no fee. A filing date and search filed online is £275 plus £27 for each claim over 25 claims. A filing date, search and examination filed online is £405 plus £27 for each claim over 25 and £13 for each page of description over 35 (gov.uk, checked 14 August 2026).
- Professional fees, to the attorney
- Set by each firm and published by nobody. This is the charge for drafting the specification and claims, filing, and dealing with the IPO through search and examination. Gov.uk states plainly that IPO fees do not include any professional help or advice, and that a patent attorney can cost several thousand pounds.
Why the drafting fee is where the money should go
Gov.uk states that an invention must be new and inventive, that it must not have been made publicly available anywhere in the world, and that you cannot change your invention once you file your initial application, for example by adding completely new features. It also warns that if you make a mistake or miss something out, your application could be rejected and you may not be able to apply for the same invention again. That is the whole argument for spending on the drafting. The specification and claims filed at the start define what can ever be protected, and no amount of later expenditure widens them.
How to read a quote
- Ask for official fees and professional fees to be shown as separate lines, so you can check the official half against gov.uk.
- Ask which official fees the quote assumes: filing only, filing and search, or filing, search and examination. They are different figures.
- Ask what is assumed about the number of claims and the length of the description, since both carry additional official fees above the thresholds.
- Ask what is excluded, particularly responses to examination reports, which are the least predictable part of the work.
- Ask what the same firm would charge for advice alone, if you are not yet sure the invention is worth patenting.
The cost driver behind the professional fee
| Driver | Why it moves the fee | What to ask |
|---|---|---|
| Technical complexity | The attorney has to understand the invention well enough to describe and claim it precisely. A subtle chemical or software invention takes longer to capture than a simple mechanism | Who in the firm has the relevant technical background, and will they do the drafting |
| Number and breadth of claims | Claims are the legal boundary of the monopoly and drafting them is the skilled part of the work. They also carry an official fee above 25 claims | How many claims the quote assumes, and what happens if more are needed |
| Whether a search is done first | A prior art search before drafting can avoid spending on an application that was never going to succeed, at the cost of an earlier outlay | What a search would cost and what it would and would not tell you |
| Prosecution | Responding to search and examination reports is open ended by nature: it depends on what the examiner raises and how many rounds it takes | Whether responses are inside the quote or charged as they arise, and the firm's usual experience in this field |
| Territories | Each additional country brings its own official fees, its own local attorney and often translation. This multiplies rather than adds | A staged plan showing when each territorial decision has to be made and what it commits you to |
Official fee figures on this page are quoted from gov.uk as at 14 August 2026 and the IPO's Patent forms and fees publication was updated on 1 April 2026. Fees change, so verify current figures on gov.uk before budgeting.