Someone already has your name
A squatter holding your domain. A company incorporated under your trading name. An application to register your brand as a trademark in a market you were about to enter. Each has its own procedure, its own deadline, its own cost, and its own realistic odds — and in more cases than anyone selling these services will tell you, the cheapest move is not to fight at all.
These are four separate systems that do not talk to each other. Winning one gives you nothing in the others. Before spending anything, be clear about whether your complaint is about a domain, a registered company name, a pending trademark application, or someone trading under your name — because the answer decides everything that follows.
- Someone registered my domainThe UDRP three-part test, what it costs, and the conjunctive word in element three that sinks most complaints
- Someone incorporated a company using my nameA £400 UK procedure almost nobody knows exists, and what it can and cannot order
- Someone is applying to register my brandTwo months in the UK, three in the EU, thirty days in the US — and what happens once you miss it
- When buying the name beats winning itThe arithmetic nobody does before instructing someone, including the cost of losing
Two things that are true of all of them
None of these award you money. A domain complaint transfers or cancels a registration. A company names application orders a name change. An opposition stops a registration. If you want damages you are in court, which is a different order of cost and a different decision.
Delay costs you standing. Opposition windows close absolutely. Elsewhere, sitting on a problem while the other party builds a business under the name makes their position stronger and yours weaker, because several of these tests turn on whether they have a legitimate interest by the time you complain.
Reviewed 2026-09-20. General guidance on how these procedures work, not advice on your dispute. Fees and rules change — every figure here should be confirmed at source before you rely on it.