IPOS has issued Practice Direction No. 2 of 2015, the effect of which is to declare the following as excluded days:

  • the eve of New Year’s Day

  • the eve of the first day of Chinese New Year

  • the eve of Christmas Day

Thus, the 24th of December and the 31st of December will be excluded days.

As the date of the first day of Chinese New Year changes from year to year, the date of the eve of the first day of Chinese New Year will also change.

The Singapore Ministry of Manpower publishes a list of public holidays for Singapore on its website. The list usually includes public holidays for the current year and the following year, and may be consulted to establish the date of Chinese New Year.

These days will be excluded days for business conducted before all registries, including the Trade Marks Registry, the Patents Registry, the Designs Registry and the Plant Varieties Registry of IPOS.

An excluded day is a date when business cannot be done at IPOS. All matters with deadlines expiring on and are not filed by the eve of New Year’s Day, the eve of the first day of Chinese New Year and the eve of Christmas Day of each year will have their deadlines extended to the next working day which is a non-excluded day.

In other words, any deadline that falls on an excluded day will be regarded as having been met, if whatever is needed to meet the deadline is done on the first working day following the excluded day.

The text of the relevant practice directions may be found on the IPOS website.

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