When looking into protection for your trademarks, there are a lot of options.  You can try to do it yourself.  I recommend that you hire a trademark attorney, instead.  But there is also the unfortunate “Door #3”: using one of the many mass-trademark-filing companies.  Trademarkia is one of the biggest names in this field.  Or at least it was… until it was re-branded under the LegalForce name.  With reviews like these, I’m not terribly surprised.  However, the LegalForce reviews online do not do much to inspire confidence, either.

In this post, I will share the 3 most recent LegalForce reviews from Google Business and then from Yelp (newest to oldest) as of the writing of this post.

Google Business LegalForce Reviews

Attorney Raj V. Abhyanker, owner of LegalForce and Trademarkia, violated the attorney-client privilege by disclosing confidential client information without the client’s authorization. This is a serious ethics violation that could result in disbarment and money damages. (1-star out of 5)

The worst experience ever, don’t waste your time and money they’ll keep asking for more money and the worst RUDE customer service (1-star out of 5)

If I could give zero stars I would. Absolute garbage, associated with the scam artists at Trademarkia. (1-star out of 5)

Ouch.  Well these LegalForce reviews were certainly succinct.  And although they were short, they still say a lot about the customer service experience at LegalForce.  As for accusations of misconduct, I’d rather not go there…

Well fortunately the reviewers on Yelp were a little more verbose.  That’s one way of putting it.  The other is that the most recent LegalForce reviews contain some serious ranting.  Let’s look at each of these LegalForce reviews individually.

Law Firm/Non-Law Firm Limbo

As a business owner with 3 registered trademarks, I suggest you RUN!  DO NOT USE THEM to 1.) Search available marks 2.) File your trademark. 3.) Expect customer service

This place is a scam and a rip off.  They claim to be attorneys when you want a refund but are non attorneys when performing any actual work.

I have 3 registered trademarks and I thought using them would save me time and headache.  WRONG.  The site is inaccurate and they refuse to admit they are wrong and would rather rip off a client? Crazy!  I have other trademarks I wanted to file.  SO, I will do the easy thing and filing them myself at uspto.gov/trademarks-app…

They essentially stole my money and gave me nothing!  You could be next. (1-star out of 5)

The interesting thing to me about this review is the point he brings up about whether LegalForce is a law firm or not.  These companies seem to prefer operating in this gray area so that they are a law firm when it’s convenient, but refuse to be held to the same standards as attorneys.  LegalZoom, for example, explicitly states that they are not a law firm.  However, you can pay for a consultation with an attorney through their website.  They also offer trademark searches and application filings.  LegalForce is a law firm (as far as I can tell), but I wonder what percentage of their clients ever actually speak with an attorney?

Sales Tactics

Do not go with them.. they always upsell and do not get your case done on the first time.. they will ask more money usually in Thousands of dollar. Do not go with them and loose your trademark.. There are plenty good one out there.. never use them. (1-star out of 5)

Obviously this person did not have a good experience either.  I have noticed that it is a common tactic in this industry to upsell clients on services.  For example, when I did my own LegalZoom search, the pricing advertised on their page is automatically increased, and you have to remove various add-on options to get back down to that price.  I cannot speak to this person’s experience, but many LegalForce reviews seem to complain about these additional charges.

Office Action Response Fees

This last one is trimmed down because the original review was very long:

I paid almost $300 for my filing and trademark examination with LegalForce Law for my small business.  I used the same verbiage as many of my competitors who also have similar trademarks.  After their legal examination, LegalForce’s trademark lawyers determined that my trademark was approved for filing, they then filed it with the US trademark office[…]  I thought I was all set.  Yay!!!! – right? Wrong.

LegalForce then continued to e-mail me about paying them additional funds to file for an international trademark as well. I ignored those e-mails as I just want to stay in the US. Then, months later, […] LegalForce asked me via e-mail for another $398.00 to re-examine the verbiage (that they had already approved once) so I could have my trademark adjusted.

I was upset and confused[…], so I scheduled a phone call with one of their lawyers assigned to the case. The lawyer I spoke with claimed that the reason the verbiage did not pass initially was because the lawyers at LegalForce are not “trademark mind readers”. Then, the lawyer admitted that there was actually no cost to re-file the trademark with the US trademark office with corrected verbiage, and that the additional cost ($398.00) to remedy the verbiage would go directly to LegalForce for their services of RE-EXAMINING THE VERBIAGE THAT THEY ALREADY APPROVED[…]

I wish that I could give 0 stars.  But hopefully by writing this, I may deter someone from making the same mistake that I made.  Good luck with your trademark! (1-star out of 5)

This person had a bad experience with LegalForce because they were not up front about which costs would be included with the trademark application.  It sounds like the issue with this application was a very simple administrative one.  However, LegalForce was going to charge more to fix it than what it initially charged for the application!

Conclusion

It is important whenever you hire someone to perform services on your behalf that you know what you are getting and for how much.  These LegalForce reviews show that that has been a major problem for their customers.  But more than that, they seem to use unpopular sales tactics like upselling that are not ideal for customers of any business, and especially not a law firm.  While their trademark filing fees are admittedly lower than my own, I can only imagine the charges that one might rack up if no additional work is included past the filing of your trademark application.  I’m sure in most if not many cases those clients end up paying much more.  And I provide my clients with up-front and competitive pricing, while still offering prompt and professional customer service.

Avoid Becoming LegalForce’s Next Unsatisfied Customer

If you want personalized customer service from an experienced trademark attorney, please call me at (480) 360-3499, email me at kevin@yourtrademarkattorney.com, or complete the contact form found on this page to schedule your free initial consultation today.  I look forward to speaking with you.