Maintaining accurate voter lists is a shared responsibility between an association’s election administrator and its members.
An administrator may be tasked with contacting members, confirming their contact information, and entering changes in association election software. But a member who proactively keeps their data current will avoid missing important notifications and running into issues that could prevent them from voting.
After certain life events, voters need to update their information in voter lists maintained by associations. Examples of triggering events include:
There may be other reasons an association updates voter rolls, such as the addition of a new member, the death of a member, changes to membership fees, lapses in membership payments, or legal issues. Removing voters from lists and correcting errors in association voter records must be done very carefully to ensure that eligible voters aren’t accidentally removed and the integrity of the list is preserved.
The election administrator making updates must also ensure compliance with association rules and regulations, as well as applicable state and federal laws.
| Triggering Event | What Members Should Do | Why It Matters |
| Name change (marriage, divorce, etc.) | Update your full name in the voter database. | Ensures your identity matches voter records |
| Moving to a new home | Update mailing address and any related info. | Prevents ballots from being sent to old addresses |
| New email or mobile number | Update contact info immediately. | Guarantees timely notifications for elections |
| Membership changes (new member, death, fee lapses) | Confirm or update eligibility status. | Keeps voter rolls accurate and compliant |
| Legal or regulatory updates | Follow admin instructions to verify info. | Ensures adherence to association rules and laws |
Voter lists are constantly changing, making it necessary to continuously associate member changes with voter updates. For election results to be trusted, an accurate list of eligible voters needs to be maintained at all times.
This way, only current members of the association receive a ballot at the correct address or device, and they can vote without incident. Additionally, those running the election can better allocate the appropriate number of staff and resources to keep it running smoothly.
When a member wants to vote, their identification must match the voter information contained in the list. If it doesn’t, they may not be permitted to submit their ballot. If this happens often enough, the results of an election may not reflect the true opinions or wishes of the membership base.
Attention to voter lists also builds trust among members that the election process is secure, transparent, and efficient.
ElectionBuddy has been used by world-class organizations across the globe to manage their industry-specific voting needs. We have fine-tuned our system based on our experience handling nearly 350,000 elections and fifty-five million votes for our clients.
ElectionBuddy’s intuitive, easy-to-use voting platform offers features that streamline the process of updating voter information. For example, administrators can quickly filter their database by multiple parameters and review the results within the ElectionBuddy system or export to Excel. Associations can identify notices that were ‘undelivered’ and contact those voters for updated contact information.
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