You always have to read the official description very carefully. "Patent leather" should mean it's really leather, just the word "patent" means that it can be just shiny coated vinyl. For instance all those Liquid Gloss items from a few years ago were described only as Patent or "Patent Fabric" in the full descriptions and they're NOT genuine leather, which most resellers on Ebay and other sites either don't know or deliberately lie about. Coach's Liquid Gloss is coated fabric, not leather. The coating can be PVC or other chemical compounds. PVC coating is also used on some coated fabric items, and Coach has made some all-plastic items such as clear tote bags with printed graphics.
Patent may be easy to keep clean but it's very susceptible to color transfer, even more than regular leather, so you shouldn't carry a lighter color patent bag with any heavily dyed clothing like a denim jacket.