The Village of Point Edward is reporting that about 16 per cent of its eligible voters have already cast ballots. CAO Jim Burns said the response has been about eight to one, online versus telephone. He said they were able to resolve a glitch in the telephone system Friday.
"When the system was set up for the English Separate School Board, the computer was set up to only allow each elector to select one candidate, and they were supposed to be able to select two," said Burns. "So we contacted our provider right away, and they were able to get the solution to the problem by about 6:30 p.m. Friday evening."
Burns said they were able to see who had voted and are contacting the 31 individuals affected.
In Sarnia, Deputy City Clerk James Jenkins said Monday they've had inquiries about telephone voting, but they weren't aware of any glitch that would impact a person's ability to cast their ballot.
"We're investigating cases where people have said they've experienced the same prompt being made," said Jenkins. "But in cases that have come to us, we've been able to confirm that a person's vote was cast successfully."
Jenkins' suggestion at this point to anybody voting by telephone would be to "hang up if you think you might be experiencing a glitch, because you can stop and resume the voting process as much as you want, it's not until your ballot is cast that you can't reverse your vote."
Jenkins reminds residents they can call, or visit a voter help centre for assistance, but they don't have any confirmed cases of a vote being made in error as a result of the telephone voting system.
The city clerk's office reported Monday that as of 9 a.m., 12.8 per cent, or 6,486 of the 50,470 eligible voters had cast ballots.
Voting continues until 8 p.m. election day October 22.
