Central Otago District Council electoral officer Kara Leckie said it was ''disappointing'' changes in ''across-town'' postal delivery targets from one day to up to three days had apparently affected the number of votes received yesterday, after the changes took effect on Monday.
Twenty-six Central Otago votes - the lowest daily number since voting began on September 23 - were received, compared with 331 the day before.
''It's disappointing because we like to keep the processing up-to-date but we're assured votes will get priority delivery for the rest of the week by New Zealand Post,'' Mrs Leckie said.
Queenstown Lakes district electoral officer Jane Robertson said the district's votes were counted by the Central Otago district and only 47 votes were received yesterday - the second-lowest number since voting began. She described this as ''anomalous'', considering 337 votes were returned on Monday.
New Zealand Post spokesman John Tulloch said voting forms would be given ''priority'' treatment from today to make sure they were processed in time. Meanwhile, many electors appear to be leaving it until the last minute to return their vote.
By 4pm yesterday, 34.3% of the 13,929 Central Otago voting papers had been returned, compared with 45% at the same time during the 2010 election.
In the Clutha district, 35.42% of votes had been returned by 7pm on Monday, compared with 42.78% at the same time during the 2010 election.
By mid-afternoon yesterday, 25.4% of the 4783 voting papers sent out by the Lakes District Council had been returned, compared with 33% at the same time last election.
Although more than 9600 people are still to vote in the Waitaki district, returns to date
remain at a similar level to the last election in 2010. So far, 37.96% of voting forms have been returned, compared with 38.66% at the same stage in the last election.
This year's returns are also at a similar level in the Waimate district, where the return rate is 37.87%, but almost half of voters in the Mackenzie district have already cast their vote. A total of 1376 people, accounting for 46.14% of eligible voters in the Mackenzie, have already voted. Invercargill residents have been slow to return their local body election voting papers.
As of yesterday, 12,676 papers had been received, 33% of papers distributed. At the same time during the 2010 election, 16,413 papers had been returned, 46.1% of those distributed.
Voting by Southland District Council residents is on a par with 2010. So far, 6474 or 32.9% of papers have been returned, which compares with 31.7% at the same period in 2010.
In Gore, 2750 papers representing 30.7% of papers had been returned as of yesterday. That compares with 39.9 at the same time in 2010.
