A design agency delivers a brand identity package to a client. Six months later, the client disputes ownership of the logo, claims the design was their own concept, and refuses to pay the final invoice. The agency has email chains. The agency has Slack messages. The agency has Figma version history.
None of it is sufficient to establish legally binding authorship or prove the client formally accepted the deliverables.
This scenario repeats in creative, digital, and communications agencies across Switzerland and the EU. The cause is the same in nearly every case: the agency never created a tamper-proof record of who created what, when, and who formally accepted it.
The two records that matter in an IP dispute
When a dispute goes to a lawyer or a court, two questions dominate: who created the work, and did the client formally accept it?
Email is not a legally reliable answer to either question. Email can be forged, altered, or disputed. A client can claim they never received a particular version. Thread continuity is not legally equivalent to a signed acceptance.
The records that carry weight are: a timestamped delivery that is cryptographically sealed at the moment of sending, and a qualified electronic signature from the client confirming acceptance.
Timestamped delivery as authorship proof
Under the Berne Convention, copyright attaches automatically to an original work at the moment of creation. The challenge in disputes is proving when that creation occurred and who was the author.
A PAdES-signed document with an embedded RFC 3161 qualified timestamp from an accredited Swiss TSA creates a legally anchored record: this document, in this exact form, was sealed at this time. The signature identifies the signing party. The timestamp is from a regulated authority. The combination is far stronger than any email chain in a Swiss or EU court proceeding.
When an agency seals each deliverable milestone at the point of delivery, they build an immutable record of authorship and chronology that no client can credibly dispute after the fact.
Client sign-off with qualified electronic signature
Acceptance of creative work is only as strong as the signature that records it. An email reply saying "looks good" is not an acceptance in any legally meaningful sense. A qualified electronic signature (QES) on a client acceptance document is.
Under ZertES Art. 11, a QES carries the same legal weight as a handwritten signature in Switzerland. Under eIDAS Art. 25(2), it does the same across EU member states. A client who signs an acceptance document with QES cannot credibly claim they never agreed to the deliverable specification.
For cross-border clients, eIDAS creates legal equivalence across 27 EU member states. An agency based in Switzerland can request QES acceptance from a client in Germany, France, or the Netherlands with the same legal effect in each jurisdiction.
The complete audit trail an agency should build
The ideal process creates a closed chain:
- Project brief sealed at signing, QES from both parties
- Each deliverable milestone sealed with RFC 3161 timestamp at delivery
- Client acceptance per milestone: QES on formal acceptance document
- Final delivery sealed and accepted: QES sign-off confirming all deliverables meet spec
- IP transfer clause included in the final acceptance if the client is acquiring copyright
Every step in this chain creates a document that is tamper-evident, timestamped by a regulated authority, and signed by an identifiable party under a recognised legal framework. At any point in a future dispute, an agency can produce this chain and establish exactly what was created, when, and what the client agreed to.
IP transfer and client ownership
In Switzerland, copyright in creative work belongs to the author by default under the Federal Act on Copyright and Related Rights (URG). A client does not automatically own work they commission. Ownership transfers only when it is explicitly assigned in a legally valid agreement.
A QES-signed IP transfer clause in the project acceptance document creates that valid assignment. Without it, the agency retains copyright regardless of what informal communications suggest, and the client has no enforceable ownership claim on the deliverables.
This is useful for agencies and clarifying for clients. An explicit, signed IP transfer is better for both parties than relying on assumptions that may not be legally enforceable.
Practical implementation
Setting up this process does not require building custom infrastructure. For each project, seal the brief, each delivery milestone, and the final acceptance using a platform that provides PAdES signatures with RFC 3161 timestamps from an accredited QTSP. Request QES from clients on acceptance documents before moving to the next milestone.
The result is a portfolio of legally grounded records for every project, created at the natural points in the workflow, without additional overhead beyond what the agency already does for project management.
See the agency solutions page for a workflow breakdown specific to creative and digital agencies.
