4.3.4 Discretion under Article 12(4) RPBA 2020
In T 1655/20 the first auxiliary request, which was filed for the first time with the statement of the grounds of appeal, was an amendment to the party's case which could be admitted only at the discretion of the board (Art. 12(2) and (4) RPBA 2020). The board considered that the amendment (deletion of "particularly", thereby rendering a feature mandatory) resulted in a further limitation of the claim in a genuine attempt by the appellant (applicant) to respond to the objection of lack of novelty raised by the examining division in the decision under appeal. Furthermore, this amendment did not lead to any complex subject-matter and did not appear to introduce further issues which would negatively impact on procedural economy. In view of these reasons the board admitted the first auxiliary request into the appeal proceedings.