An Important Message from the U.S. Copyright Office Regarding Pandemic-Era Accommodations

The U.S. Copyright Office is retiring its Deposit Ticket Declaration Form—a temporary accommodation adopted during the COVID-19 pandemic. This accommodation is no longer necessary now that the pandemic emergency has ended.

Beginning July 27, the declaration will be removed from the Office’s website, and the Office will no longer accept electronic deposit copies submitted with this form.

During the pandemic, the Office’s building was closed for an extended period, and the Office implemented mandatory telework requirements for most of its staff. To mitigate the effect of this disruption on the copyright registration system, the Office created a temporary accomodation for applicants who were required to submit physical copies of the “best edition” of their works, providing them the option to also upload an identical electronic copy of the work. This allowed the Office to examine the claim while staff were working remotely. Now that the Office's staff is routinely working on-site, the temporary accommodation is no longer needed.

If the Office receives a declaration form and an electronic copy of a work after July 27, the examiner will request a physical copy of the best edition of the work (in cases where it is required) and will notify the applicant that the claim will not be examined until the Office receives the physical copy.

Reminder: Physical deposits must be mailed to the Office with a printed shipping slip generated by the electronic registration system. The shipping slip must include the title of the work being registered. Without a shipping slip, the Office will not be able to connect the physical deposit with the appropriate registration application. Step-by-step instructions for generating a shipping slip are provided in the Office’s tutorial video, which can also be found on YouTube.