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[asdfg]

I am a Patent Agent and am required to write patentability opinions (not PCT) for clients. I would like to know how many hours you are  expected to spend on this which includes reading and understanding the invention disclosure, doing the prior art search and  writing the opinion.Thanks.

[petethebody]

Depends upon the field of the invention.  Simple mechanical devices usually took me about 12-16 hours when I first started.  Now, I can do a simple device in 4-8 hours I've done it so many times.  The key is all about finding the class/subclass on the PTO website.  Also, you should remember that the going rate for a patentability opinion is about $500, which means that a practitioner charging a low rate of $100/hr should take about 5 hours. 

I am a Patent Agent and am required to write patentability opinions (not PCT) for clients. I would like to know how many hours you are  expected to spend on this which includes reading and understanding the invention disclosure, doing the prior art search and  writing the opinion.Thanks.

[bleedingpen]

Also, you should remember that the going rate for a patentability opinion is about $500, which means that a practitioner charging a low rate of $100/hr should take about 5 hours. 

I am a Patent Agent and am required to write patentability opinions (not PCT) for clients. I would like to know how many hours you are  expected to spend on this which includes reading and understanding the invention disclosure, doing the prior art search and  writing the opinion.Thanks.

That seems incredibly low to me. 

[bartmans]

Indeed extremely low. First of all, you would need a good prior art search for a patentability opinion, which not only involves searching for earlier US patents and patent applications, but also searching for all documents, including scientific literature, foreign patents and may be even the internet.
A good prior art search would be priced from $1000-$2000 if you outsource, depending a bit on the subject.
Then you need time to spend on studying the uncovered documents and compare them with the invention to see if they anticipate. Lastly, you have to write things down in a language that is understandable to your client.
I cannot believe that all of this can be done professionally for only $500.

[GW EE]

No harm in just asking your supervisor about how much time each task should take.  If you are uncomfortable with asking about hours, you could ask about the budget for the project and divide by your hourly rate (keep in mind review time).  Also, I agree with Bartmans.

[bleedingpen]

I cannot believe that all of this can be done professionally for only $500.

I won't mention any names, but there are sweat shop type firms that team up with the various invention submission companies that will do a "patent search" for $500 or less.  The one that I saw was simply a title key word search and printing off the first 10 references found.  They then had a one paragraph blurb about why you should file a patent application with them for $2500.