Case T‑708/14

Marpefa, SL

v

Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market (Trade Marks and Designs) (OHIM)

‛Community trade mark — Period within which an action must be brought — Late submission — Manifest inadmissibility’

Summary — Order of the General Court (Sixth Chamber), 3 February 2015

1. Actions for annulment — Time-limits — Mandatory — Examination by the EU judicature of its own motion

   (Rules of Procedure of the General Court, Art. 102(2); Council Regulation No 207/2009, Art. 65(5))

2. Judicial proceedings — Application initiating proceedings — Formal requirements — Application lodged by e-mail within the time-limit for bringing action — Written signature of the lawyer different from that appearing on the original of the application sent by post — Consequence — Date of receipt of the e-mail not taken into account for the purposes of determining whether time-limit for bringing action complied with

   (Rules of Procedure of the General Court, Art. 43)

3. Judicial proceedings — Application initiating proceedings — Formal requirements — Signed original of the application not submitted before expiry of the time-limit — Inadmissibility

   (Rules of Procedure of the General Court, Art. 44(6))

1.  See the text of the decision.

   (see paras 8, 9)

2.  If the text transmitted by e-mail does not fulfil the conditions of legal certainty imposed by Article 43 of the Rules of Procedure, the date of transmission of the copy of the application by fax or by e-mail cannot be taken into consideration for the purposes of compliance with the time-limits for taking steps in proceedings, and only the date of lodgment of the signed original will be taken into consideration for such purposes.

   Moreover, for lodgment of a procedural act to be valid, Article 43 of the Rules of Procedure, governing the possibility of considering the date of transmission by e‑mail of a copy of the signed original as the date of lodgment of an application, requires the party’s representative to sign the original of the application by hand before transmitting it by e-mail and to lodge that original at the Registry no later than 10 days thereafter. In these circumstances, should it later appear that the signed original of the pleading physically lodged at the Registry within 10 days of being transmitted by e-mail does not bear, at the very least, the same signature as the one appearing on the document transmitted by e-mail, that element will suffice for considering the two documents to be different, even if the signatures have indeed been appended by the same person.

   (see paras 14, 15)

3.  See the text of the decision.

   (see para. 24)