Election software for Inspectors of Elections
BallotLink is the software an Inspector of Elections uses to run a California HOA board election: build the ballots, deliver them, keep them secret, and produce the result. The functions the law reserves for the inspector are reserved for the inspector in the software, and every ballot you open is written to an access record.
The problem inspectors deal with today
You are the one who has to defend the election if somebody challenges it, and the tooling usually gives you nothing to defend it with.
An inspector appointed across several associations is typically running each election on a different stack: the association's own paper process, a Management Company's spreadsheet, a generic survey tool that was never built for a secret ballot. The ballots sit wherever they sit. Access to them is a matter of who is in the room. When a member asks who looked at the ballots and when, the answer is whatever anyone happened to write down — and your independence is the thing being questioned.
What BallotLink does for you
It gives you one place to run every election you are appointed to, and a record behind each action that shows you ran it properly.
- Set the election up yourself — voting method, candidates, voting period, and the election rules for distribution.
- Choose the voting method the rules call for — plurality, cumulative or approval — and get ballots generated to match.
- Deliver ballots by email, on paper, or both. Electronic voters get a personalized link; paper voters get printed ballot PDFs and complete vote-by-mail packets.
- Resolve write-in candidates yourself — off by default, enabled per election, one slot per ballot.
- Open a ballot and have that view recorded. Every ballot inspection writes an access record.
- Finalize when you are ready. No result exists in the system until you finalize the election, and nothing closes or counts on its own.
What this doesn't do
There is no candidate nomination workflow — names are entered by an administrator. There is no proxy voting. Someone still prints and stuffs the physical mail. Ranked-choice voting is in development.
Who can reach the ballots
Ballot management functions belong to the Inspector of Elections, or to an Election Services Company serving as one. A managed association cannot create, edit, delete or pay for its own elections. Every inspector view of a ballot is written to an access record, and no vote totals exist anywhere before the inspector finalizes — not for the board, not for the Management Company, not for a BallotLink administrator.
What that gives you when a member asks who could have reached the ballots is a record rather than an assurance. More on thecompliance page.
How to get started
Get in touch, and we set you up as an inspector so you can run your first election.
- Tell us about the election — the association, the voting method, and roughly when it runs.
- We set you up with an inspector account.
- You create the election, set the voting method, and add the election rules for distribution.
- Ballots go out, members vote, and you finalize the result.
The objection we hear most
"If this election gets challenged, does this software actually help me?"
Honestly: it helps with the parts that are records, and it does not do your job for you. What it gives you is an access record of every ballot inspection, and a result that provably did not exist before you finalized. What it does not give you is a substitute for your own independence and judgement as inspector — those remain yours, which is the point of the role.
Questions inspectors ask
Does BallotLink replace the Inspector of Elections?
No. BallotLink is the tool an inspector uses. Every decision the law reserves for the inspector — resolving write-ins, finalizing the election — is made by the inspector in the software.
Can a board member or manager see ballots while voting is open?
No. Ballot management functions belong to the Inspector of Elections, or to an Election Services Company serving as one, and every inspector view of a ballot is written to an access record. No running vote totals exist for anyone before the inspector finalizes.
What record is kept of who looked at a ballot?
Every time a ballot is opened, that view is written to the access record. The record is per view, not per session.
When do results become available?
Only after the inspector finalizes the election. Before finalization, results do not exist in the system for anyone to see, including the inspector.
Can I run a cumulative or approval election?
Yes. BallotLink supports plurality, cumulative and approval voting. The method is set when the election is created and the ballots are generated to match.
What if some members will not vote electronically?
They vote on paper in the same election. BallotLink generates printed ballot PDFs and complete vote-by-mail packets alongside the electronic ballots, and returned mail-in ballots are entered by the inspector.