Local Level
At the national level, as well as at the local level, logistics should be carefully planned for receiving results from several locations at the same time. When possible, efficiency is improved if one phone number or fax number is given to people transmitting the interim results to the local office of the electoral management body. Most telephone systems now allow for calls to a single number to automatically switch to the next available phone unit on that line.
A form with pre-printed information blocks needed during vote result collection should be provided to staff answering the phone. For example, one team should take care of the incoming results, and should transmit them to the data entry person or person in charge of gathering the results for the electoral district.
A wall chart, chalkboard chart, or spreadsheet listing each polling station should be prepared and then completed as the results come in. Once all the information for each poll is received, the combined result for the entire electoral district should be updated. This summary will be sent to the national level.
National Level
At the national level, the same type of logistics should be used, but on a larger scale. Fax communications are easier at the national level. Since the information needed is already written, it can help to speed up the process for data entry or manual tabulation. Also, a similar spreadsheet should be used at the national level listing all electoral districts. A first quick quality control check should be done to verify if the results make sense or not. A more exhaustive quality control checking procedure, for each electoral district and its polling stations, will need to be done when the final, official results are compiled.
If a country is divided into several time zones, the results will come in at different times of the day at the national level (depending on the closing hour of the polls). The required staff should be carefully scheduled to be available when they are needed to compile the national interim results.
For interim results, all types of ballots (if possible) should be included so as to avoid any major discrepancy between interim results and final results. Special ballots, write-in ballots, mail-in ballots, as well as ballots cast on ordinary polls, advance polls, and mobile polls should be part of the count for interim results. For more details on these ballots, please refer to Voting Procedures.
Depending on the amount of delay that is acceptable, special ballots can be counted a few days prior to election day, or after the closing of the polls on election day. If the latter is the case, then the counting procedure should be designed carefully, so it will still be possible to include special ballot results in the interim results.
For the special ballots (mail-in and write-in ballots), envelopes received at the head office of the electoral management body are sorted by category: absentee, armed forces, etc. Different coloured envelopes will facilitate the sorting by category.
For mail-in ballots, three envelopes are originally sent to the voter: a return mailing envelope containing an outer envelope (on which may appear the bar code and signature of the voter or other administrative information), and a secrecy envelope containing the ballot. After verification of proper registration and no previous vote having been taken, and the creation of the audit trail, the secrecy envelope is put into a ballot box with its ballot still inside.
If the special ballots are counted a few days prior to election day, the results should be kept highly secure, and only released at the closing of the polls on election day. In some systems special ballots are counted after the polling day, and in others, on polling day.
If advance polls take place over several days, a reconciliation can be done at the end of each day, but the ballot choices are not counted. This reconciliation measure is done to create an audit trail of ballot usage. The advance poll ballot boxes are then kept safely until polling day, and counting should take place at an office of the electoral management body at the closing time of the ordinary polls. The counting of advance poll ballots should be done in the presence of representatives of political parties/candidates/options, as well as national/international electoral observers. The counting procedures are nearly identical to those used for ordinary polls.
Counting for mobile voting stations may take place at the last place visited, or at an office of the electoral management body. To count the votes of incarcerated voters, the procedures used for advance polls may be applied, but, of course, this will only be possible if voting by incarcerated voters takes place prior to election day.
If ballot boxes and results are delivered simultaneously (i.e. where telephones, fax etc. are not available), the local office of the electoral management body should carefully plan the reception of the ballot boxes and the results.
Some measures should be carefully planned to avoid confusion, if all the ballot boxes and results are arriving at the same time. First, to respect the order of arrival, a receiving official could immediately give a number to the person arriving from a polling station with the ballot box and the results. Then, in chronological order, the identity of each delivery person should be verified, the polling station identified, and the results should immediately be taken and placed in a specified area ready to be compiled. The receiving official should then verify the ballot box, and the authenticity of its seals, and prepare a receipt for the person who delivered the materials, as well as one for the electoral management body. The ballot box should then be removed from the reception area and be placed in a secure storage room where more detailed verification can be done.
Use of Technology
Phones and faxes are widely used in the transmission of electoral results. To ensure the identity of the person transmitting results via phone, an identification number or code should be given to them. A password may also be considered for fax transmissions. This is a simple and efficient way to avoid unauthorized people calling in and giving false results.
Transmission of results by modem and computer can also be done. Once again, safeguards and passwords must be built in to restrict the transmission of results to authorized persons who are permitted access to the system.
For all types of transmission, the systems must be tested prior to polling day to verify their capacity under the heavy use they will encounter on election night. A technical specialist should also be available at any time, in case of system failure. A contingency back-up system should also be created, tested, and fully available.
