EN:Monitoring Task

Monitoring tasks and automatic searches enable the automation of specific internal processes.
If a patent fulfills certain requirements, it can be added to a monitoring task.
A specific group of users is tasked to process these patents, e.g. evaluate the patents.
Critically evaluated patents can be further processed and transferred to another monitoring task.
In this step the user group can decide e.g. whether these patents should be included in a observation (legal status monitoring).

The monitoring task „observes“ a folder regarding new patents.
New patents can be added to a folder via an automatic search or by manually assigning them to a folder.
Additionally it is also possible that the monitoring shows new patents without them previously having been assigned.
One reason could be that new family members were added to the patent family.

Once patents are included in the monitoring task, they receive the status "New" or "None".
Users can then set the status to "not relevant" or "OK".
This status only refers to the current monitoring task.
Therefore the same patent can have a different status in a different monitoring task or project
Once the status "not relevant" or "OK" is assigned, the patent is not considered "New" in the monitoring.
The patent is the considered "processed".

A monitoring task always has to be linked to a group of users.
All users in this group are able to access the monitoring and are able to edit new patents and set a new status.
Evaluations and comments can be assigned to the monitoring tasks.

The monitoring task always has a basis, which can be selected when setting up the task.
(Document, application, strict family or extended family)
The basis of the monitoring task can differ from the basis of the folder and the automatic searches.

Example

The following set up (basis) was used creating the single steps:

• automatic search - application
• folder – extended family
• monitoring task - application

It is assumed that the following patent family with 5 applications is already assigned to the folder.

Additionally the 5 applications of the family were previously assigned the status „OK“ in the monitoring task.

In summary the following starting situation:

The folder contains the extended family and the monitoring tasks contains all 5 applications of the family.
All 5 applications have the status "OK".

With the weekly database update a change is now made.
The family is added a further application. A JP-Patent was added:

Now the following will happen:

As the folder only contains the extended family, the addition of the application will not change the amount of families in the folder (as the family is already assigned to the folder).
However, in the monitoring task the amount of applications increases and respectively the JP-Patent is displayed with the status „New“.

This means that this process is not affected by the automatic search finding the new application or not.
The monitoring tasks relates to the folder, the folder contains the family, the family „grows“ with a new application. Therefore the new application is added to the monitoring task.

E-Mail Notifications

Automatic E-Mail notifications can be activated for monitoring tasks.
All users who are assigned to a monitoring task are automatically notified about „new“ patents.
The following intervals of notifications are available:

• daily
• weekly
• monthly

Example
If the weekly interval is selected, the E-Mail is not always sent on the same day of the week.
The E-Mail is only sent when new patents are contained in the monitoring and no E-Mail was sent during the last 7 days.
This means that it is possible that no E-Mail is sent over a period of several weeks, as no new patents were added to the monitoring.
From the day an E-Mail was sent, you will not receive a new E-Mail for another week until new patents are available in the monitoring.

If the daily interval is set and patents are not processed (status set) then an E-Mail is sent every day.
This process does not depend on new patents being added to the monitoring.
As long as „old“ patents keep the „New“ status, the E-Mail is sent.