Estate agents domain being sued...

[sandhu40]

Hello everyone,

I wonder if you could advise..

I have an estate agents and have purchased the domain ?????Foxton.co.uk and .com

????? is a first name, for arguments sake lets say it's AndrewFoxton.co.uk

Can foxtons .co.uk lay any claim that I am doing anything wrong? Despite the fact that my name isn't Andrew Foxton and I completely made that name up...

Any advice would be helpful

 

[bensd]

If you're trading as XXXXX Foxton and use the domain XXXXXfoxton.co.uk/.com you shouldn't have a problem

 

[tifosi]

Question is WHY you would chose the ????foxton name if it isn't your personal name - or one by association if you have purchased the goodwill to an existing business - to use in the SAME industry as the primary surname site which is itself a uk leader.

Passing off can be subtle or like this a blunt instrument.

 

[Systreg]

There are 6 trademarks in the UK for "Foxtons", they're for:

Foxtons protography
Foxtons antiques
Foxtons weekend market
Foxtons Sunday market

The other 2 are for estate agents, see IPO links:

http://www.ipo.gov.uk/ohim?ohimnum=E3083979
http://www.ipo.gov.uk/domestic?domesticnum=2268070

Can foxtons .co.uk lay any claim that I am doing anything wrong? Despite the fact that my name isn't Andrew Foxton and I completely made that name up...

It would be the other way around, if your real name was Andrew Foxton, then you may be able to use that, as that's not your name, you may well find you will have problems.

 

[martin-s]

Property is my industry.

It's very common indeed to use two common names (often both surnames) to come up with an estate agency name.

And Foxton is an old surname indeed:
http://www.surnamedb.com/Surname/Foxton

For instance, http://www.foxtonhayes.com/.

As such, providing your branding is very distinct from theirs, I wouldn't worry about it at all. "Andrew Foxton" is not "Foxtons"

 

[Edwin]

If you're being sued and the domain's important to you, get a lawyer.

If you're being sued, and the domain's irrelevant to you, hand it over.

Either way, you're not going to be able to mount an adequate defense in a case like you outlined based on tips received on an online forum! Simply too many variables...

 

[stellar73]

Are you changing the name of the Estate Agency to re-brand or have you been trading as 'Andrew'Foxton for some time?

If it's the former then I'm not sure why you would have chosen a name so similar to such a well known company. As it's not your actual surname I also think you could have problems. Apart from anything else it's going to confuse your customers even if you don't get sued.

 

[martin-s]

The other factor is where you operate. Foxtons are M25 only currently (excluding Guildford and Woking). They are very much known as a London agent..