What is the Customer Number practice in patent applications?

The Customer Number practice allows applicants to:

• Designate the correspondence address of a patent application or patent
• Designate the fee address of a patent
• Submit a list of practitioners who have power of attorney

Using a Customer Number allows applicants to easily change the correspondence address, fee address, or list of practitioners for multiple applications or patents by simply changing the information associated with the Customer Number.

According to MPEP 403: “A Customer Number (previously a ‘Payor Number’) may be used to: (A) designate the correspondence address of a patent application or patent such that the correspondence address for the patent application or patent would be the address associated with the Customer Number (37 CFR 1.32(a)(5)(i)); (B) designate the fee address (37 CFR 1.363) of a patent such that the fee address for the patent would be the address associated with the Customer Number (37 CFR 1.32(a)(5)(ii)); and (C) submit a list of practitioners such that those practitioners associated with the Customer Number would have power of attorney (37 CFR 1.32(a)(5)(iii)).”