Elections and voting · Town money, debt and taxes

Paper ballots vs. online voting

Full title: Paper Ballots vs. Online Voting · Written by John Farrugia

First publishedOctober 19, 2026

Last updatedOctober 26, 2026

Records checked up toOctober 19, 2026

Full report11 pages, with every source

This report explains how Strathroy-Caradoc has voted in town elections since 2003, what each way of voting cost, who chose online voting, and the record of the company that runs it.

What happened

The town last used paper ballots at polling stations in 2003, used paper ballots sent by mail in 2006 and 2010, and has used only online and phone voting since 2014.
For each eligible voter, mail ballots in 2006 and online voting in 2022 cost about the same: $2.81 and $2.82. Fewer people voted online, so the cost for each ballot actually cast was higher.
Council approved online voting in 2013 and renewed it in 2021 and 2025, each time on the Clerk's advice. None of these was a recorded vote.
In 2021 and 2025 the company, Intelivote, was hired without a competitive tender, as part of a group rate with other Middlesex (and in 2026, Elgin) towns.
The report found no recount or court challenge anywhere that showed Intelivote's system miscounted votes, and nothing in it shows that any Strathroy-Caradoc election was compromised.

Why it matters to you

Online and phone voting is how residents choose their Council, so it helps to know what it costs, how the company was picked, and what risks experts point to. With online voting there is no paper ballot to count again by hand.

Words with a dotted underline: tap them to see what they mean.

What the evidence shows

Shown in recordsTown documents, minutes or other official records show this.Reported, not provenSaid in the news, by a person, or claimed in court. Not proven by records.Still unansweredA question the records do not answer yet.

Shown in recordsStrathroy-Caradoc last used polling-station paper ballots in 2003, used mail-in paper ballots in 2006 and 2010, and has used only internet and telephone voting since 2014. page 2
Shown in recordsPer eligible voter, mail ballots cost $2.81 in 2006 and online voting cost $2.82 in 2022; these per-voter figures were worked out by the review from the published totals. page 3
Shown in recordsCouncil renewed online voting in 2021 and 2025 on the Clerk's recommendation; the minutes show no recorded vote, and the 2013 approval is described as 'unanimous' only in the news. page 4
Shown in recordsIn 2021 and 2025 Council waived its purchasing by-law, so Intelivote was hired without a competitive tender. page 5
Shown in recordsNeither the 2021 nor the 2025 staff report to Council mentions Intelivote's 2022-23 court-supervised debt restructuring. page 5
Shown in recordsThe 2025 staff report said 'over 300' Ontario municipalities used internet voting in 2022, while academic and CBC counts give 219, and it gave voting day as Sunday, October 25, 2026 instead of Monday, October 26. page 7
Reported, not provenThe review's search of news, court reports and municipal records found no recount or challenge showing Intelivote miscounted votes; two recounts elsewhere changed a total by one vote each without changing the winner, and the report says this count is a minimum, not a complete total. page 6
Reported, not provenResearchers say anyone holding a voter's mailed PIN letter could try to vote with it, and voters cannot independently check that their own ballot was counted. page 7
Reported, not provenThe Clerk wrote that IP addresses and phone numbers are logged and tied to the voter but not to the ballots, and that ballots stay encrypted until 8 p.m. on election day. page 8
Still unansweredThe Clerk said a security test was done in August 2026, but who did it, what it covered and what it found have not been made public. page 8

Key numbers

Cost per eligible voter, mail ballots, 2006$2.81 page 3

Cost per eligible voter, online and phone voting, 2022$2.82 page 3

People who voted in 20227,027 (38.8%) page 3

Estimated cost of the 2026 electionabout $70,000 page 3

Payment to Intelivote on August 14, 2026 ('Voter Letter Services')$39,294.90 page 3

Money owed to public lenders not recovered in Intelivote's restructuringabout $6.8 million page 5

Still unanswered

Who did the August 2026 security test (penetration test), what it covered, what it found, and whether any problems were fixed.
Which other voting companies were looked at in 2025, and how they were compared.
What the August 14, 2026 payment of $39,294.90 covers, and the actual costs of the 2010 and 2014 elections.
Whether staff or the county clerks' group knew about Intelivote's 2022-23 debt restructuring.

What's in the full report

What you need to know page 1
1. How Strathroy-Caradoc has voted page 2
2. What each method has cost page 3
3. Who decided, when, and why page 4
4. How and why Intelivote was chosen page 5
5. Intelivote's record page 5
6. Errors and gaps in the 2025 staff report page 7
7. What the public has not been shown page 8
The Clerk's answers on ballot secrecy (October 19, 2026) page 8
Notes page 9
References - clickable links page 9
Updates and corrections page 11

Words used in this report

Eligible voter: A person on the voters' list who is allowed to vote, whether or not they actually vote.
Turnout: The share of eligible voters who actually voted.
Tender: An open call for companies to compete by sending in bids.
Waiving the purchasing by-law: Council setting aside its own buying rules, for example to hire a company without asking for competing bids.
Recorded vote: A vote where each member's yes or no is written in the minutes. Otherwise the minutes only say a motion 'carried'.
Tabulator: A machine that counts paper ballots.
PIN letter: The letter mailed to each voter with a personal code used to vote online or by phone.
Recount: Counting the votes again. With online voting it re-runs the same computer count, because there are no paper ballots to count by hand.
Court-supervised debt restructuring (CCAA): A court process that lets a company in money trouble keep running while it reworks what it owes.
Penetration test: A security test in which testers try to break into a system to find weak spots.

Updates and corrections

Every change to this report is listed here. An Update adds new information. A Correction fixes a mistake. A Minor change is wording, layout or branding only.

Update October 26, 2026
Added a $39,294.90 payment to Intelivote dated August 14, 2026 ('Voter Letter Services'), from the payables list on the October 19, 2026 Council agenda, and added what it covers to the list of records not public; no finding changed.
Update October 19, 2026
Added the Clerk's October 19, 2026 answers on IP and phone-number logging, ballot encryption and the August 2026 security test, and updated the audit statements; no finding changed.
Original publication October 19, 2026
First release.

This page is a short guide to the full report. If they ever seem to differ, the full report is the record. Questions or corrections: john.v.farrugia@gmail.com.