You may change your plans for mailed ballot voting

You may change your plans for mailed ballot voting

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Don't worry if you change your mind and now, rather than return a mailed ballot via mail, want to return it in-person to the Bucks County Board of Elections or choose to vote in person on November 3rd at the polls. You may return your voted ballot at any of the three new secure ballot drop boxes in the County. You can find the hours and locations here or by calling the Board of Elections at (215) 348-6154.
If you have registered to vote and checked your voter registration at VotesPA.com/status, applied for a mail ballot, and received confirmation of that, you will be listed in the voter roster at your polling location as voting by mail. Our Pennsylvania General Assembly adopted 2020 Act 12, which provides that voters can come to the polls and vote, despite having applied for a mail ballot, provided the Board of Elections has not already received the voted ballot. If you bring along the mail ballot itself and the official envelope for its return with the affidavit printed on it, both will be "spoiled" by the Judge of Elections at your poll. You and the Judge of Elections will then sign a statement, and you can then vote using the machine. This process will take some time so try to do this mid-day when the polls are least busy.
If you do not have your mail ballot, perhaps not yet having received it, you may cast a provisional ballot in person at the polls on Election Day. Election officials count those provisional ballots determined to have come from voters who did not otherwise vote. The review of provisional ballots takes place within seven days following the election. Provided that the Board of Elections did not receive your mail ballot ahead of November 3rd, your provisional ballot cast at the poll will count the same as everyone else that has voted.
Important things to remember on what promises to be a busy day: a provisional ballot has an envelope that both you and the Judge of Elections from your poll will need to sign for it to count. If you are voting for the first time, and have forgotten your ID you, too, will have the opportunity to vote by provisional ballot but will be required to provide an acceptable ID to the Bucks County Board of Elections within five days of voting. Once you have completed and signed the envelope, in the places where the voter is requested to sign, return it there at the polls to the Judge of Elections and receive your provisional ballot identification receipt.
Voting your mail ballot, putting it correctly into the secrecy envelope, and then the addressed envelope, which you must complete and sign, and putting that into the secure ballot drop boxes is the most time-efficient for all concerned. Arriving at the poll with your mail ballot and the official envelope with the declaration printed on it for signature will permit you and the election officials at the poll a course of action to vote in standard fashion. If possible, try to do this at off-peak hours. Should there be no recourse but to vote via provisional ballot, you will not be alone. The first time with the no excuse mail ballots, during the June Primary Election, voters cast roughly 2,500 provisional ballots in Bucks County, most because of issues with mail ballots.
The League of Women Voters of Bucks County has two videos explaining voting in person and voting by mail. "Vote Securely By Mail in 2020" and "Vote Safely at the Polls in 2020" .

League to which this content belongs: 
Bucks County