Deadlines are not always set down in an explicit way. However, there is a general trend according to which the periods during which electoral appeals can be filed have been reduced. Such a trend is derived from a couple of needs. On one hand, it is necessary to renew public offices without any delay whatsoever. On the other hand, it is necessary to spend less and less time campaigning.

Two different appeals that can be distinguished from each other produce different filing deadlines. On one hand, deadlines are very different for those appeals used to challenge voters’ registries. We can find three-daydeadlines (Costa Rica, Guatemala, and Panama), four-day deadlines (Mexico), five-day deadlines (Chile, Dominican Republic, and Uruguay), fifteen-day and twenty-day deadlines (Argentina) and even thirty-day deadlines (Colombia). With regards to the preparations for the election day, we find three-day deadlines (Brazil and Guatemala), four-day deadlines (Mexico) and five-day deadlines (Argentina and Uruguay). Some countries’ deadlines are farther, such as the appeals against the registration of political parties (ten days in Peru and thirty days in Paraguay).

On the other hand, there are also different deadlines to file appeals against electoral results. We have those which can be filed within twenty four hours after the counting has been done at the voting sites (Bolivia and Colombia); we have “claims” and “complaints” which can be filed before superior electoral authorities (before elections are validated), which have to be filed within two days at the most (Argentina, Ecuador, El Salvador and Dominican Republic); we have some other cases in which electoral results must be appealed within three days (Brazil and Costa Rica), within four days (Mexico) and five days (Honduras, Nicaragua, Panama and Uruguay). In Chile, electoral deadlines are set at the fifteenth day, while in Venezuela they are set at the twentieth or even the thirtieth day (with respect to the presidential contest). Peru decided to leave a more open deadline. Appeals can be filed there until a candidate has been declared as the winner.

Concerning electoral results, it must be noticed that some systems for electoral litigation authorize departments within their electoral authorities to solve appeals within different deadlines, such as those three days established in both Brazil (when the Supreme Electoral Tribunal solves the appeals filed against the rulings issued by regional electoral tribunals) and Mexico (when the Superior Court of the Electoral Tribunal solves the appeals filed against the rulings issued by regional courts on the inconformity appeals derived from congressional elections); as well as in Bolivia, without a specific deadline (when the National Electoral Court solves the appeals filed against the department electoral courts); and another option is an appeal filed within the same superior electoral authority (Guatemala and Nicaragua). In addition, some systems include the possibility of appealing before a non electoral judicial authority for constitutional reasons (Bolivia; Brazil, three days; Guatemala, five days to fill a constitutional review in the Supreme Court and two more days for an appeal at the Constitutional Court, like in Honduras or Panama), legality reasons (Colombia, eight days), or even a revision before a political authority (Argentina, with no specific deadline).

Deadlines to solve electoral appeals are not always regulated, and those that indeed are, have great variations. Regarding the appeals against the electoral registry, the deadlines to solve them fluctuate between six (Chile and Mexico), eight (Guatemala) and ten days (Uruguay). Appeals against the creation of new parties vary from three (Costa Rica), four (Peru), six (Mexico), ten (Argentina) and fifteen days (Chile). Also the appeals filed against acts to prepare the election must be solved within three (Guatemala), five (Argentina) or six days (Mexico).

There are also some systems that do not specify a deadline, but they establish a point of reference such as before the declaration of the election (Costa Rica), before the elected authority takes the office or before the installment of the state congress (Mexico for state elections), or finally a deadline marked by an specific date (Mexico, which means twenty days for regional electoral tribunals to solve appeals filed against congress elections and ten to fifteen days for the superior electoral authority in the Electoral Tribunal for reconsidering appeal against congress election or sixty days for presidential election).

Deadlines granted to jurisdictional bodies to solve appeals filed against autonomous electoral authorities in the matter of electoral results vary from three days (for the Supreme Court of Guatemala to solve trials related to the violation of fundamental rights), five (for the Constitutional Court of Guatemala to solve appeals), to fifty days (Colombia).  

In Argentina, regarding the appeals against electoral results filed at political agencies, there are no deadlines. As a matter of fact, with regard to congressional elections, appeals can be filed even after Congress is opened for business (which means that congressmen hold their seats in a provisional way. In other words, they can be removed and replaced by other candidates after an appeal has been solved).