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Where our service stops and legal advice begins

We are not a law firm. What that means in practice, and where the boundary between document analysis and legal advice sits.

We are not a law firm and we do not provide legal advice. Our service reads documents and reports what they contain. Everything that requires professional judgement — whether a rejection is well founded, what to amend, whether to appeal, what your chances are — belongs to a registered US patent attorney or agent. Any response filed at the USPTO is filed by such a practitioner under their own professional responsibility, not by us.

So can you help me or not?

With understanding your document, yes, and that is often the part nobody else will do quickly or cheaply.

With deciding what to file and filing it, no — that is legal work reserved to registered practitioners, and we will introduce you to one rather than pretend otherwise.

Where the line is

What we do and what requires a practitioner
We do thisA registered practitioner does this
Report which grounds of rejection appear in your documentAssess whether each rejection is well founded
Calculate the reply period from the mailing date and action typeAdvise on strategy in light of the deadline
Explain what a ground of rejection generally meansAdvise what it means for your claims
Summarise what the examiner wroteDecide how to answer it
Describe the routes available after a final actionRecommend which route to take, and file it

On automated analysis

Part of our analysis is produced by an automated language model reading your document. That is disclosed everywhere it applies. A model reading a document is not a lawyer reading a document, and we do not present it as one: it extracts and summarises, its output is tied to specific pages, its uncertainty is shown rather than hidden, and a person reviews it before you see it.

We do not use automated analysis to generate a response to the USPTO, and we do not intend to. Drafting a reply is legal work.

If your deadline is close, do not wait on us

Our analysis is fast but it is not a substitute for acting. If a reply period is about to expire, contact a registered US patent practitioner immediately, and note that extensions of time under 37 C.F.R. 1.136(a) can often be bought if the six-month statutory limit has not passed.

Not sure whether your question is one we can answer?

Questions people ask

Because advising on a specific application is the practice of patent law before the USPTO, which is restricted to registered attorneys and agents. Telling you what your document says is not restricted, and that is what we do.

Where a compensation arrangement exists with a practitioner, it is disclosed. It never affects what our analysis of a document says, and it never means an unnecessary referral is recommended.

Where this comes from

Every statement of law or procedure on this page traces to a primary source you can check yourself.

Last reviewed August 30, 2026