ElectionBuddy can send postal notices to voters without electronic contact information. The postal notices contain all the same information that an electronic notice would contain: vote details, voting instructions, and an access link, and are typically sent as postcards.
Postal notices are less effective the shorter your vote duration is. They take time to reach your voters, whereas an electronic notification method is more instantaneous. If your vote is only running for a few days or even a few weeks, you will not be allowing enough time for your voters to receive their notice and take the time to vote. As a general recommendation, whenever possible, utilize a multi-channel strategy if you would like to notify your voters via mail.
This postcard can contain an optional QR code, which voters can scan to be taken directly to the ballot. You will have to provide the voters' mailing addresses in your voter list.
Postal notices are a feature available to elections in the professional pricing tier. Please see our pricing page for more information on the pricing of features. There is also an additional cost for postage - please contact us with the number of voters on your voter list and we can quote you a price!
Setting Up Postal Notices
On the "Notice" page, select "Postal notices”, as well as any other notice types you may need:
Several options will appear:
Include a QR code: Scanning a QR code on a cellphone will authenticate the voter and take them to their ballot in one quick step. Unsure of what a QR code is? Check out Wikipedia!
Delay Delivery: This delay determines how many days ElectionBuddy waits before sending the voter notice information to our printing company. Useful if running a multi-channel vote (i.e. you're notifying voters to vote in a combination of methods).
If a voter votes electronically before the delay is over, and no longer needs to receive a postal notice, they are removed from the list of voters whose data will be sent to our printing company.
This saves you money on postage, as your credit card will be refunded for any postal notices that do not need to be sent out.
However, once that delay is over and the information is sent to the printing company, you will be charged for all postcards that were sent to the printer, even if a voter does not use the mailed notice specifically to vote.
Include a Return Address: typically an organization's mailing address so notices are returned to you if the voter has moved to help prevent unauthorized ballot submissions from individuals outside of your organization. Return addresses must be within the USA.
To include a paper ballot, the return address is mandatory (as displayed in the screenshot above). This is because your voters will need to return the paper ballot.
Include a Paper Ballot: the postal notices will include a paper ballot that voters can return to vote via paper, as opposed to using the online ballot.
Your voter list will require mailing addresses for voters that are receiving postal notices.
ElectionBuddy's mailing provider will only send notices based on USPS deliverability. If an address comes back as undeliverable, this is either because USPS doesn't recognize it as an address at all or because USPS recognizes it as an address but can't deliver there.
Testing Postal Notices
When running a test vote with postal notices, your postcards will not be mailed. Once the test is running, you can preview your postal notice in the Voters tab of the Results page by selecting a voter and choosing "Preview Mail":
A window will open after a few moments:
Selecting the link will open a PDF of your postcard in a new tab.
To learn more about the timing of Notices please see this article: Notice Delivery - Timing of Email, SMS, Postal, Printed, and Manual Notices.