Owners of registered trademarks often worry about costs and time to defend against infringement. The Intellectual Property Office have reported that one in three sme’s suffer infringement and that legal defence can take months with legal costs of five figure sums. The solution can be very different as shown below
My trademark client emailed me an infringement issue whilst I was enjoying a family vacation abroad. I replied the same day with a single sentence instruction and an attachment. My client forwarded this to the third party using appropriate mediation language. Their response is below
“Thank you very much for bringing this to our attention.
I would like to offer my sincere apologies for the unauthorised use of TrustCo PLC registered logo on our LinkedIn page and website. This was a genuine oversight and entirely our responsibility. The issue originated during our recent outsourced website renewal, and unfortunately the error went unnoticed on our side. It is, frankly, a rookie mistake in our start‑up journey, and we take it very seriously.
Following your email, we immediately reviewed all of our materials, both public‑facing and internal. We have now removed the TrustCo PLC logo from all platforms and assets under our control, and we have reinstated our own original logo in every location.
To the best of our knowledge, there should no longer be any instances or usage of TrustCo Plc’s logo across our website, LinkedIn, or any other materials. We will also be tightening our internal review and approval processes to ensure that something like this cannot happen again.
Once again, please accept my sincere apologies for this mistake and any concern or inconvenience it may have caused. We fully respect TrustCo Plc’s intellectual property and can confirm that we will not use your logo in the future without your explicit prior written consent. Kind regards”
One email, one attachment, no advisory fees, no court costs, resolved within days by applying an informal courteous approach with clear information without legal jargon or threats. This is mediation at work accelerating dispute resolution. Mediation is an essential tool for risk mitigation.
source Tim Scripps, MD TrustCo PLC www.trustco.co.uk for IT and cyber security
for IP protection and mediation contact Clive@consult-smp.com
https://consult-smp.com/archive/2025/01/how-ip-mediation-save-time-and-costs.html
