About to Miss the 31-Month Deadline for Korea? Read This First.

Every month we hear from applicants and foreign counsel who discovered Korea's deadline late. Here is what can genuinely still be done — in order of how much time you have left.

If the deadline is days away: it is very doable

Korea is one of the fastest major jurisdictions to enter at the last minute, because the entry-day requirements are minimal:

• We need only the PCT number, applicant details, and a signed POA scan (no notarization; it can even be regularized after filing).
• The Korean translation normally accompanies entry — but if translation time is the bottleneck, a 1-month extension (to 32 months from priority) can be requested within the 31-month period, official fee ₩20,000.
• Filing is electronic; same-day entry is realistic when instructions arrive during Korean business hours.

In short: instruct first, perfect the papers after. The unforgivable mistake is spending the last 48 hours collecting documents that Korea never required.

If the 31-month date has just passed

Check two things immediately, with a Korean attorney rather than by assumption:

• Recompute the deadline. Priority-date errors are the most common false alarm — withdrawn priority claims, earliest-vs-latest priority confusion, and date-line slips regularly turn "missed" into "ten days left."
• The translation-extension window. If entry was made in time and only the translation is outstanding, the 32-month translation route may still save the case.

If the deadline is truly gone: an honest answer

Korea has not adopted the reinstatement mechanism of PCT Rule 49.6, and there is no general "unintentional delay" revival of a lapsed national phase right, unlike the practice in some jurisdictions. As a rule, once 31 months (and the translation window) have passed, the Korean route via that PCT application is closed. Extremely narrow relief tied to causes genuinely outside the applicant's control exists on paper but is rarely available in practice — we will tell you plainly whether your facts have any realistic chance rather than sell false hope.

What we can assess: whether any parallel path remains on your facts — for example, a new Korean filing where the invention has not yet been publicly disclosed and no self-collision arises (rare, but worth ten minutes of checking), or protecting improvements in a fresh application.

The cost of the rescue

Nothing about urgency changes our published fees: filing USD 520–640 (AI-assessed), translation at USD 18/100 words (English), official fee ₩46,000. No rush surcharge — speed is a workflow property, not a billing event.