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How to Manage Trademark Families and Filings by Jurisdiction

This article explains how a trademark's filings are organized as a family and how to add a filing in another country.

Written by Jonathan Liu
A trademark detail page showing the Family section with a jurisdiction tree, Route and class number columns, coverage dots, and the Registered, Pending, Lapsed, Status not mapped, and IR scope legend

Prerequisites

  • You are viewing a trademark that has at least one filing.

  • Your role can edit trademarks if you want to add filings.

Reading the Family Grid

Open a trademark from Trademarks > List and scroll to Family. Each row is a jurisdiction; a country with several filings shows a filings count that expands them. The Route column shows how the filing was made, such as National, Madrid Protocol, or Regional.

Each remaining column is a class number. A filled dot means the filing covers that class: green for registered, yellow for pending, and an outline for lapsed. Hollow dots mark the scope of a Madrid international registration, where protection lives in its designations. A further legend entry, Status not mapped, covers filings whose office status has no matching status in your workspace. Hover a dot to see the office status for that class.

Click a country name or a dot to select that filing. The sidebar, Classes, and Description sections update to the selected filing, and hovering the country shows its numbers and dates.

Steps: Adding a Filing to the Family

  1. On the detail page, click the edit (pencil) icon in the sidebar. The Edit Trademark drawer opens.

  2. Click Add Trademark in Country under the Steps list. A modal titled Add a filing to [mark]'s family opens.

  3. Select how the new filing relates to the family:

    • Direct national or regional filing of the same mark — Select one or more Countries. Where the dates allow, tick Claim Paris Convention priority.

    • Madrid designation under an existing international registration — Select the Countries to designate.

    • Madrid international registration with a filing here as the basic mark — Optionally select Initial designations.

    • New application for classes not covered — A further application in the same office. Select the Classes.

    • Divisional — A division of an existing filing. Select the Classes to split off.

    • Something else, start from a blank form — Start with an empty step.

  4. If several filings could be the source, pick one under Source filing. When only one qualifies, it is named in the option itself and no Source filing list appears.

  5. Click Continue. A new step opens with the country, route, classes, and relationship already filled in.

  6. Complete the remaining fields, then click Save Changes.

The Add a filing modal, titled for the mark, with the Madrid designation option selected and its international registration named in the option label, and a country chosen in the Countries multi-select

Recording Relationships and Filing Bases

Each filing step ends with a Related Filings section. Click Add Relationship and select the relationship type. The options cover Paris priority claims, Madrid basic marks and designations, divisionals, conversions, and refilings. Enter the prior application number; the country and filing date fill in when it matches a filing in the family.

US filings carry a Filing Basis selector with 1A, 1B, 44(d), 44(e), and 66(a). Section 66(a) stands alone and replaces the others. Each class can override this with its own Class Filing Basis; leave it empty to use the filing's basis.

Note: Priority windows and Madrid dependency dates computed from these relationships appear in the sidebar of the detail page.

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