A retiring Victorian mayor was appalled to find a ballot paper for this month's council election arrive on Monday, three days after voting closed.
The form for Alpine Shire mayor Peter Roper's son had been requested on October 16, in line with Victorian Electoral Commission advice, but it reached their Tawonga address too late to be returned as a valid vote.
Under VEC rules, ballots needed to be sent by 6pm Friday to count.
"I just think our current mail system is broken and given Friday was the day of the grand final holiday there's going to be a quantity of votes that haven't gotten there or gone missing," Mr Roper said.
"Postal voting is great as long as you can get your paper."
Mr Roper said the VEC needed to improve its processes, noting the Alpine Shire was paying between $130,000 and $150,000 to the authority to conduct the poll.
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He said an in-person vote at the election office at Bright had been offered but he estimated it would cost $70 to travel there and it would be preferable to pay a fine.
VEC spokeswoman Ruth Murphy said it seemed Mr Roper's situation was a rarity.
In Alpine Shire, as of yesterday, 8918 ballots, equating to 79.85 per cent of those distributed, had been returned, a tally higher than the turnout at the last election of 76.33 per cent.
"In short, there is no evidence of widespread missing ballot packs in the Alpine Shire Council election," Ms Murphy said.
Across the state 75,000 substitute ballots were issued.
"What we hadn't anticipated was the much larger than expected number of people requiring new ballot packs to go to different addresses, largely due to voters moving temporarily or permanently to a new address and not updating their details with the VEC," Ms Murphy said.
Mail seeking views for non-voting will land in 2021.
"The notice is not a fine but an opportunity for voters to explain why they haven't voted," Ms Murphy said.
"If the voter can provide a valid reason as to why they haven't voted then they may be excused."
