Patent Office Employees Found To Have Wasted Their Time, Taxpayer Money

According to a report issued today by the Office of the Inspector General (OIG) of the Department of Commerce, hundreds of thousands of the claimed work hours of patent examiners at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office cannot be reasonably accounted for. After a minute–by–minute review of data for 94% of all patent examiners’ claimed work over two overlapping periods—February 22, 2015 to November 28, 2015, and August 10, 2014 to November 28, 2015—the OIG reached the following troubling conclusions, relying on a “conservative approach” to the evidence uncovered:

• For the nine–month period, the OIG found 137,622 unsupported hours spent by 8,100 examiners, equating to some $8.8 million in waste. These hours, if spent on examination, could have reduced the backlog of pending applications by 7,530.
• For the fifteen–month period, there were 288,479 unsupported hours spent by 8,400 examiners, equating to some $18.3 million in potential waste. These hours, if spent on examination, could have reduced the backlog of pending applications by 15,990.
• The vast majority of the 296 examiners with 10% or more unsupported time during the nine–month period were rated as “Commendable” or “Outstanding” on annual performance evaluations.

Some of the waste and abuse documented occurred under a tele–work program, which launched in February 2015. The OIG identified significant gaps in PTO oversight of the tele–work program, including a failure to require teleworkers to log into their computers on workdays if they do not tele–work full–time, and a requirement that only examiners identified as poor performers provide work schedules to their supervisors.

The complete report can be read here. All eyes on will now turn to the PTO for its response to these troubling conclusions.