Poland Patent and Trademark Fake Invoices: Verify UPRP Fees, Bank Accounts, and Report Scams

If you filed a patent, utility model, or trademark in Poland and then received a payment demand that looks official, this Poland patent trademark fake invoice guide is for you. The real risk at this stage is often not the filing itself. It is that public filing data can trigger misleading invoices, fake decisions, fake certificates, or urgent payment reminders that look close enough to UPRP correspondence to fool a busy founder, finance team, or overseas applicant.

This guide focuses on what happens after filing: how to verify whether a payment request is really from the Polish Patent Office, what to do if you already paid, where to report the scam, and where certified translation can help if the suspicious document is in Polish.

Key Takeaways

• UPRP says it has one official bank account and, in its latest scam warning, reminded users that official fees are collected only in PLN.
• UPRP also warns that it does not send decisions or protection certificates by ordinary email. If you chose electronic service, trademark grant decisions should come through official channels such as ePUAP, PUEUP, or the registered electronic delivery address, with an electronic signature and QR code for verification.
• Counterintuitive but important: a fake email can still include a real uprp.gov.pl link. A real link does not make the whole message genuine.
• If money already left your account, the first call is usually your bank, then cybercrime reporting. If the issue is a suspicious message or website, report it to CERT Polska or, for phishing SMS with links, forward it to 8080.

Who This Guide Is For

This guide is for people dealing with patent or trademark filings in Poland at the national level, especially foreign founders, overseas brand owners, in-house legal teams, admin staff, and applicants working through a Polish patent attorney who have received a payment request, invoice, decision, certificate, or reminder after filing.

It is most useful if your working language is English but the incoming paperwork is partly or fully in Polish. The most common file bundle is a filing number, a suspicious letter or PDF, bank account details, an email or envelope, and earlier instructions from your own representative or filing team.

Why This Problem Shows Up in Poland

This is not just a generic IP scam page with a country name inserted. In Poland, the timing of the scam is tied to how UPRP publishes filing information. For trademarks, UPRP states that it discloses the filing in its online search system without delay and no later than two months after filing, including the applicant name, seat or residence, filing number, and goods and services data. That disclosure rule is explained on UPRP's trademark publication page: ujawnienie zgłoszenia.

That matters because scammers do not have to guess. They can watch public data and send a payment demand when the filing starts to look real to the applicant. UPRP has issued repeated warnings over the years, including fresh warnings in 2025, which tells you this is an ongoing practical problem rather than a rare anecdote.

For patents and utility models, the publication rhythm is different, but the same broad logic applies: once there is enough public visibility or enough procedural context, fake payment requests become easier to target.

What a Real UPRP Payment Situation Usually Looks Like

Keep this part short and practical. You do not need a full patent or trademark tutorial here. What matters is knowing when a payment demand fits the real workflow and when it does not.

• UPRP publishes its official fee base and bank account on its fee page: Opłaty w postępowaniu.
• UPRP contact details for verification are public: al. Niepodległości 188/192, 00-950 Warsaw, phone +48 22 579 05 55, email [email protected], office hours Monday to Friday 8:00-16:00, with Monday information duty extended to 18:00 on the official contact page: Kontakt.
• UPRP accepts only cashless payments by bank transfer or postal order. It does not need a private registry business to collect statutory office fees on its behalf.
• If you appointed a patent attorney, your real fee instructions should usually come through that representative, not from an unknown registry-style business you have never dealt with.

The practical takeaway is simple: if the payment path, account, currency, sender, or delivery channel looks different from your original filing path, stop and verify before paying.

How to Verify UPRP Fees and Bank Accounts in Poland

1. Check the recipient and account number against the official UPRP fee page. The official account published by UPRP is NBP O/O Warszawa: 93 1010 1010 0025 8322 3100 0000.
2. Check the currency. In its September 11, 2025 warning, UPRP again stated that its fees are collected only in złoty. A request for euro or a foreign-bank payment is a major red flag.
3. Check the filing record. If you are not even sure whether your application is at a stage where any official action should be happening, compare the suspicious letter with your record in the UPRP online search system.
4. Check the delivery channel. UPRP says it does not send decisions or protection certificates by ordinary email. If you selected electronic communication, verify whether the document came through the official delivery method you actually chose.
5. Check whether the document asks for a vague registry, publication, protection, or listing fee from a private entity rather than a statutory UPRP fee listed in the official fee tables.
6. Call UPRP or your own patent attorney before paying. Use the contact details you already know or pull them yourself from official websites. Do not use the phone number printed in the suspicious letter unless you have independently verified it.
7. If you need to verify whether the sender really is a Polish patent attorney, use UPRP's patent attorney list before you reply or transfer funds.
8. If the message contains a website or SMS link, report the digital artifact to CERT Polska before you forward it around your company.

What Real and Fake UPRP Correspondence Often Looks Like

Based on UPRP warnings and Polish bank fraud alerts, suspicious correspondence often has one or more of these traits:

• It arrives by regular mail or as a PDF attachment after filing or publication.
• It uses official-looking seals, signatures, or department names.
• It asks for fast payment to a different account, sometimes outside Poland.
• It uses labels such as decision, certificate, reminder, or protection fee to create urgency.
• It may quote real procedural facts from your case, which makes it feel believable.

One useful reality check comes from Polish bank alerts. Santander and mBank both published customer warnings about fake UPRP correspondence that copied official-looking templates and pushed recipients toward fake accounts. Those warnings reinforce the same operational lesson as UPRP: verify the account and the channel before you pay.

What to Do If You Have Not Paid Yet

• Do not reply to the suspicious sender.
• Do not click links in the email or scan QR codes from the letter until you verify the source.
• Compare the account number and currency to the official UPRP fee page.
• Check the case status or publication trail in the UPRP search system if the timing feels wrong.
• Contact UPRP at the official number or email listed on its contact page.
• If you have a patent attorney, send the document to that representative and ask for confirmation.
• If the issue came by email, website, or SMS, report it to CERT Polska at incydent.cert.pl. If it was an SMS with a malicious link, forward it to 8080.

What to Do If You Already Paid

Once money is gone, speed matters more than perfect paperwork.

1. Contact your bank immediately and ask what emergency steps are still possible. The cyber-fraud reporting guidance from Poland's Central Bureau for Combating Cybercrime starts with that same instruction: pilnie skontaktuj się ze swoim bankiem.
2. Preserve everything: letter, envelope, PDF, message headers, screenshots, account number, transfer confirmation, and any earlier filing correspondence.
3. Report the scam to law enforcement if money was lost or identity data was exposed.
4. Optionally notify UPRP as well, especially if the fake document impersonated UPRP or reused your filing details.
5. If the scam involved a website, SMS, or phishing domain, file the technical report with CERT Polska too.

Recovery is often difficult. That is exactly why this page should push users toward verification first, not toward after-the-fact damage control.

Where Certified Translation Helps and Where It Does Not

This is where many English-language articles become too generic. In this Poland-specific scam context, certified translation is usually a support tool, not the main legal requirement. If someone specifically asks for a formal translation in Poland, the local term you may hear is sworn translation or tłumaczenie przysięgłe.

• If you need to understand whether a Polish document is fake before paying, what matters first is an accurate translation of the sender, fee basis, account details, and delivery language.
• If you need to show the suspicious document to a foreign founder, overseas parent company, or non-Polish finance team, a fast English translation can prevent a mistaken payment.
• If you are preparing a bank escalation, police report, or attorney review, a clean translation can make the evidence pack easier to act on.
• If a Polish authority, court, or lawyer later requires a sworn translation for formal use, that is a separate step. It is not the starting point for basic scam verification.

For the filing side of the story, keep the deeper translation rules out of this page and use internal references instead. See our Poland filing translation guide for the document-side requirements, our patent document translation guide for the language-work side, and our certified vs. notarized translation guide if you need to decide what level of formality to order.

Poland-Specific Reality: Timing, Mailing, and Workflow Friction

• Timing risk: UPRP trademark disclosure can happen within two months of filing, so a fake invoice arriving soon after filing is not random bad luck. It can be a direct consequence of public visibility.
• Mailing risk: many scammers still use paper letters because paper feels official to finance teams. Do not assume a printed letter is safer than an email.
• Workflow risk: foreign applicants often split responsibility across founder, local counsel, and accounting. That handoff gap is where fake invoices get paid.
• Verification convenience: UPRP publishes a working phone line and email for information requests, so there is little excuse to pay first and ask later.

Local Voices and Practical Failure Patterns

Official sources should lead, but user-side examples help explain why people still get caught.

• UPRP's own warnings show the pattern evolving from fake invoices into fake decisions and fake protection certificates, including documents sent by email that point to real UPRP web addresses.
• Polish bank alerts describe the same operational failure point: the recipient sees a believable office-style document and pays before comparing the bank account.
• Polish patent-attorney blogs have documented clients receiving forged trademark grant decisions and fake certificates shortly after their filings became visible enough to target.

The recurring pain points are not abstract. They are: language barrier, urgency, public filing visibility, and internal accounting teams paying unfamiliar but official-looking demands.

Commercial Translation Help

If your main problem is that the suspicious document is in Polish, the first useful purchase is often translation, not legal strategy. CertOf can help you turn a suspicious letter, invoice, or email into an English-ready review pack before you decide whether to pay, ignore, or escalate it.

CertOf translation upload is the fastest route if you need a digital-first translation workflow. If you are not sure what format to order, see electronic certified translation: PDF vs. Word vs. paper and our online upload and ordering guide.

Official and Professional Support Paths

Resource	Type	When to use it
UPRP Information Centre, al. Niepodległości 188/192, Warsaw, +48 22 579 05 55	Official	Your first stop for verifying whether a fee demand or contact channel is genuine.
UPRP patent attorney list	Official directory	Use it to confirm whether a named representative is a real Polish patent attorney before you trust a payment instruction.
CERT Polska, incydent.cert.pl, SMS 8080	Public cyber response	Use for phishing emails, fake websites, and malicious SMS links.
CBZC cyber fraud reporting	Public law-enforcement path	Use when you already lost money or suspect broader cyber-fraud activity.

Keep the order straight: official verification first, translation second if language is blocking you, legal counsel third if the issue affects your filing strategy or rights.

Related Guides on CertOf

• Need filing-side context? Read Krakow, Poland patent and trademark filing translation requirements.
• Need broader patent-document language help? Read certified translation of patent documents to English.
• Need to order quickly? Use our online upload and ordering guide.
• Need to know what format to ask for? Read PDF vs. Word vs. paper for certified translations.
• Need to understand service expectations? Read revision speed and delivery expectations.
• Need to ask a specific document question first? Use the CertOf contact page.

FAQ

After filing a trademark in Poland, why did I receive a payment letter from a company I do not recognize?

Because your filing may already be visible enough for scammers to target. In Poland, fake invoices often exploit public filing information and imitate UPRP-style correspondence.

Does the Polish Patent Office send invoices by email?

Treat that as highly suspicious. UPRP says it does not send decisions or protection certificates by ordinary email. If you chose electronic service, verify whether the message came through the official channel you selected.

How do I verify whether a UPRP payment request is real?

Check the account number and currency against the official UPRP fee page, compare the timing against your case status in the UPRP search system, and confirm with UPRP or your own patent attorney before paying.

If the letter asks for euro or a foreign bank account, is that a red flag?

Yes. UPRP's 2025 warning again said its fees are collected only in PLN and that it has one bank account.

What should I do if I already paid?

Contact your bank immediately, preserve the evidence, then report the incident through the appropriate cybercrime and law-enforcement channels.

Do I need a certified translation to report the scam?

Not always. For quick internal verification, a plain accurate translation may be enough. Use a certified or sworn translation only if a bank, lawyer, court, or authority specifically asks for that level of formality.

CTA

If you received a suspicious Polish patent-office or trademark-office letter and cannot safely judge it in Polish, CertOf can help you translate the document into clear English before you pay, ignore, or escalate it. That is the right role for a translation service here: document clarity, evidence preparation, and certified delivery when needed, not legal representation or official fee verification.

Upload your document for translation or contact CertOf if you want help turning a suspicious letter, invoice, or email into an English-ready review pack.

Disclaimer

This guide is general information, not legal advice, patent-attorney advice, or law-enforcement advice. Official fees, filing status, and payment validity should always be verified directly with UPRP or your appointed representative. If you already transferred money, contact your bank without delay.