Contents

• What's it like to be a polling official on polling day?
• What does everyone do in a polling place?
• What happens once the voting has finished?
• Other temporary job opportunities
• Standard Superannuation Choice Form (SCF) - 2007 Federal Election [PDF 593k]

Outside the polling place

Outside the polling place supporters of candidates and political parties distribute how-to-vote material. These people are not employed by the AEC and are not polling officials.

Polling officials work inside the polling place, issuing votes to electors.

What's it like to be a polling official on polling day?

The day starts early for a polling official. The officer-in-charge is at the polling place by 7 o'clock in the morning and the other polling officials arrive by 7.30am. There's a lot to do before polling starts at 8am, the ballot papers need to be distributed to the issuing points and the ordinary issuing officers need to open the certified lists. Everything has to be in order, so that polling can start at exactly 8am.

Mornings in the polling place tend to be the busiest time as most people like to vote early. The rest of the day is quite steady. In some polling places part time staff are employed as ordinary or declaration issuing officers during the busy morning period.

Meal breaks are taken during the 'quieter' times, and there's no opportunity to leave the polling place, so bringing food from home is a must!

What does everyone do in a polling place?

• Officer-in-Charge (OIC)
  The Officer-in-Charge (OIC) manages the polling place and is responsible for the conduct of polling and management of staff at the polling place.
• Second-in-Charge (2IC)
  The Second-in-Charge (2IC) assists the OIC in managing the polling place and during peak times may assist issuing votes or act as inquiry officer or queue controller. 2ICs are only employed in large polling places.
• Ordinary issuing officers
  The ordinary issuing officers issue votes to electors whose names appear on the certified list of electors.
• Declaration vote issuing officers
  The declaration vote issuing officers issue votes to electors who are outside their enrolled division on polling day or whose names do not appear on the certified list.
• Ballot box guard
  The ballot box guard ensures that voters put their ballot papers in the correct ballot box.
• Queue controller
  The queue controller directs electors to the correct issuing point (either ordinary or declaration issuing points).
• Inquiry officer
  The inquiry officer provides assistance to electors who need help.
• Scrutiny assistants
  At 5.30pm the scrutiny assistants arrive at the polling place and under the direction of the OIC start to pack up the voting screens.

Polling places vary throughout Australia. Some large polling places take in excess of 6000 votes whereas smaller polling places in rural and remote areas may only issue as little as 100 or so votes. Larger polling places employ as many as 16 polling officials. In smaller polling places an OIC and an ordinary issuing officer may be all that's required.

What happens once the voting has finished?

After the poll closes at 6pm ordinary issuing officers and declaration vote issuing officers reconcile the ballot papers, return materials to the OIC and then assist with the sorting and counting of ballot papers.

Sorting and counting ballot papers

Once the ballot papers have been unfolded, staff commence work sorting the ballot papers into piles for each candidate. Polling staff carefully check each ballot paper to see if it is formal or informal. Informal ballot papers are placed in a separate pile for the OIC to check.

The ballot papers for each candidate are counted in bundles of 50. Once counting has finished the polling official supervising the counting records the result. These figures are rechecked and reconciled with the number of ballot papers issued at the polling place.

Transmitting results

The OIC telephones the divisional office three times during polling night: once with the result of the House of Representatives first preference votes count; then again with the result of the two candidate preferred count; and finally with the result of the Senate first preference count. The results that the divisional office receives from the polling place are entered into the AEC's Election Management system and transmitted to the National Tally Room in Canberra and displayed on the website's Virtual Tally Room.

Once all the results have been transmitted to the divisional office and the polling place has been packed up, staff are free to go home.

Other temporary job opportunities

Pre-poll vote issuing officers issue votes in pre-poll voting centres. These officers are employed for the two weeks prior to polling day and usually work Monday to Friday, from 9am to 5pm.

Electoral Visitors take votes from people in special hospitals in the week prior to polling day.

Remote mobile polling members are employed to take votes in remote areas of Queensland, Western Australia, South Australia and the Northern Territory in the two weeks prior to polling day. Working as part of a remote mobile team usually involves overnight absences.

Temporary office assistants are employed by divisions on a needs basis from the announcement of the election until several weeks after polling day.