Registering a trademark, privacy, best practices

[Apocthec]

Hi, I am looking to register a trademark, I understand I can easily do this on the trademarks.ipo.gov.uk and it will take around 4 months to be approved.
What I am not keen on is having my home address as in the public record.

Am I correct in thinking that I can first register a company using a company formations service that offers a Registered Office Address Service and then apply for the trademark under the formed companies name and associated virtual address?

Prices for this seem very reasonable, on one of many company formation websites I can find a package for £19.99 that includes company registration, a London registered office and service address for 12 months, then a yearly fee of £40 for the virtual address.

Am I overthinking this? Is there a simpler option to keeping my address private?

 

[Porky]

Well you want the trade mark registered against your company at its registered office.

Would your accountant not offer you that service?

If you want to go down the paying for a London registered office route then as long as they will forward the mail I can’t see an issue with it but you will need to keep paying every year and if you do move you will need to update both companies house and the IPO of your move.

Good luck

 

[fisicx]

Be wary of these London registered office services. They are used by all sorts of dodgy companies and it can affect your credit rating. There is one address in St Paul’s Road that has huge red flags against it.

 

[The Byre]

Am I overthinking this? Is there a simpler option to keeping my address private?

Why do you think that you must keep your address private?

Also, who are you going to do business with? If it's someone like me, we do due diligence on any major transaction - we would look you up. If we find an accommodation address, we call and try to find out who you REALLY are.

Business is all about trust. An accommodation address is the precise opposite of trust.

 

[Bob Morgan]

Be wary of these London registered office services. They are used by all sorts of dodgy companies and it can affect your credit rating. There is one address in St Paul’s Road that has huge red flags against it.

Seaborne Freight! The Ferry Company that was awarded a £14 Million Government Contract to operate services between Ramsgate and Ostend - Without having any Ferries!

 

[Bob Morgan]

. . . we find an accommodation address, we call and try to find out who you REALLY are.

I wouldn't even bother with the call! A polite 'Regret Letter' and File 13 for the enquiry!

 

[Apocthec]

Why do you think that you must keep your address private?

Also, who are you going to do business with? If it's someone like me, we do due diligence on any major transaction - we would look you up. If we find an accommodation address, we call and try to find out who you REALLY are.

Business is all about trust. An accommodation address is the precise opposite of trust.

The concern is not about me revealing my identity to whoever I do business with, the concern is around my home address being publicly available which will end up on a mailing list as soon as a bot crawls the website. This is the same reason why you use domain privacy when registering your domain name.

 

[The Byre]

end up on a mailing list as soon as a bot crawls the website.

There are 1001 ways to stop that from happening, starting with posting the address as an image. Telephone numbers are the same - just make the zeros into Os and ones as the letter small-L.

As for the address being harvested from the IPO website - that has never happened to us and we have a TM that was registered a while back that we have yet to use and we have NEVER received mail or email to that name.

 

[fisicx]

The concern is not about me revealing my identity to whoever I do business with, the concern is around my home address being publicly available which will end up on a mailing list as soon as a bot crawls the website. This is the same reason why you use domain privacy when registering your domain name.

You don’t need domain privacy - your details are no longer publicly available.

I’ve had my address on my website for years and never ended up on a mailing list. Bots don’t work like that.

 

[pentel]

my home address being publicly available which will end up on a mailing list

As a business being open is the beginning of forming trust.

Re mailing list, have you sent any post lately? The cost is prohibitive. And there is always the recycling bin.

 

[DontAsk]

Re mailing list, have you sent any post lately? The cost is prohibitive. And there is always the recycling bin.

I receive lots. Funding Circle seem to be the ones with the most money to burn.

 

[macScot]

Hi, I am looking to register a trademark, I understand I can easily do this on the trademarks.ipo.gov.uk and it will take around 4 months to be approved.
What I am not keen on is having my home address as in the public record.

Am I correct in thinking that I can first register a company using a company formations service that offers a Registered Office Address Service and then apply for the trademark under the formed companies name and associated virtual address?

Prices for this seem very reasonable, on one of many company formation websites I can find a package for £19.99 that includes company registration, a London registered office and service address for 12 months, then a yearly fee of £40 for the virtual address.

Am I overthinking this? Is there a simpler option to keeping my address private?

Yes, you can register a company and use the registered address when registering for the trademark. The registered address could be one provided by companies that provide such services.

We used 1st formations to register our company and use their address services as we did not want to use our home addresses for the business. We do not have an actual office as we work from home.

We also registered for trademarks and there was no issue with us using the company-registered address.

 

[fisicx]

I receive lots. Funding Circle seem to be the ones with the most money to burn.

Me too. But they didn’t get your address from your website. Which his what @Apocthec was alluding to.

 

[Ray272]

I have used a postal service for many years and it is very useful:

A correspondence Address

My deal is about £25 per month which includes them opening my post and scanning it to me via email.

Years ago when I was based from my home address I could not keep up with all the junk mail the business received.

Now with this correspondence address I never get any of the junk mail and I can open my mail digitally from anywhere.

Many such services around and very useful.

 

[Paul Kelly ICHYB]

What I am not keen on is having my home address as in the public record.

I also wonder why?

the concern is around my home address being publicly available

Your address is already public! Just a matter of how you search for it!

Am I correct in thinking that I can first register a company using a company formations service that offers a Registered Office Address Service and then apply for the trademark under the formed companies name and associated virtual address?

Yes

Prices for this seem very reasonable, on one of many company formation websites I can find a package for £19.99 that includes company registration, a London registered office and service address for 12 months, then a yearly fee of £40 for the virtual address.

£40 a year for a VA is good. Might be the one I use in the capital!