Are you thinking of registering a design? Are you confident that yours is new and individual? With so many designs already in use you could infringe someone else’s registered design without even realising.
You may want to find existing designs that would be useful for you to buy or licence. How can you go about this?
Read our designs search FAQ for more detailed information.
Why use this search?
There are two different types of expert searches of the UK and European Community registers that we can do for you.
- Image search - this will check whether your design or somebody else’s is similar or identical to any existing registered designs. This will help you decide whether you might face a future legal challenge if you applied formally for a registered design. Alternatively you could use this search to help inform you whether an existing registered design is valid and, as a result, vulnerable to legal challenge.
- Proprietor search - to identify any registered designs owned by an individual or company. This can give you an insight into your competitors’ designs.
Both of these searches will be done confidentially by our experienced designs examiners who are familiar with searching the UK and community registers. Once they have produced their report you will be able to discuss the results directly with the examiner at any time.
Cost and timings
The cost of an image search depends on how many designs are classified in the product area you want searched. For example, the cost of a simple search can be as little as £55 plus VAT, but if you need a broader search then the average cost will be around £350 plus VAT.
A proprietor search costs £50 plus VAT per proprietor name searched.
We will give you a free estimate beforehand to let you know what we expect the cost of the search to be.
Your tailored report will be issued within 10 working days of us agreeing the costs with you.
Contact us
To request a search you can fill
in Form D SAS PDF version 
(69Kb) or Word
version 
(294Kb) and send it by e-mail,
fax (see below for details) or by post to:-
Search and Advisory Service
Intellectual Property
Office
Concept House
Cardiff Road
Newport, South Wales
NP10
8QQ
If you need more information or advice then call us on: +44 (0)1633 811010 or e-mail us at sas@ipo.gov.uk or contact us by fax on +44 (0)1633 811020.