The board in T 1102/03 stated that, while a holiday was a possible valid basis for a request, it was not necessarily a sufficient reason for postponement. The board held that the case in hand presented circumstances which entailed a special organisational burden. The effort of postponing fixed oral proceedings until a date might be found which would suit numerous parties, the members of an extended board, and the facility management of the EPO, outweighed the effort of postponing or interrupting one representative's holiday booked to a destination within Europe. See also T 601/06, T 1610/08.

In R 11/12 the request for postponement was rejected since the representative's holidays ended three days before the scheduled oral proceedings; in addition, the planned birthday party for the day after the oral proceedings could not be regarded as being a serious reason justifying the postponing of the oral proceedings.