Transcendent
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- Oct 23, 2006
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I was manning one of the polling stations yesterday, and I got a lot of questions from friends so I thought you guys would be interested too.
First - none of us volunteered, we were simply assigned. You can get out of it only if you're pregnant, or if you are on MC (whether keng or real). We get paid ~$250-300, which sounds great, but the hours are terrible. To earn this money you need to:
do a 1-2h online course
attend a 3h training in person
for a few people, i think there was a separate training session to learn to operate the machine that scans your NRIC
help to set up the polling station the day before (4h for most people, but I was asked to go down for another 2.5h in the morning to do inventory check)
And of course Polling day itself - we were originally told 6am-8.30pm, but some of us had to be there at 4.45am, and of course after the extension we ended up leaving at 10.30pm. I've never worked 17+ hours in a day before.
So even if you ignore the 2h extension, i think the pay works out to about $10/hour. And you deal with some weird **** which i'll talk about later
Are my votes secret? Aren't there PAP people watching you at the polling station?
Yes, from what I can see votes are really secret, there's a serial number on the ballot paper but it's impossible to trace each vote back to a voter without anyone knowing. And yes, each contesting party can send people down to witness the process, PAP always has witnesses there but opposition may not send people down to every site. Even so, there is a specific place they have to sit at, and they cannot see what vote you cast. Nor can they recognise the faces of everyone who went in.
Did you know about the 2h extension? What happened?
We only found out about the 2h extension at 7+. In fact our supervisor was as confused as us, he told us that he saw the news on CNA website but ELD hasn't given any instructions. We had a lot of questions (especially since 7-8pm was supposed to be for higher-risk patients and we had to wear mask/face shield/gown/gloves) but he said she had no idea either.
Our polling station didn't really have a long queue for most of the day, but i guess some others did? Each polling station was supposed to have 20+ people manning it, but only 6 will stay back and don all the biohazard gear to serve people on MC and SHN. By the time we heard about the extension, we were down to 6 people all wearing the gear, and the rest were told to go out of the site to prevent contamination. Then 10min later, our supervisor was told that all 20+ people should man the station from 7-9pm, and only wear the gear from 9-10pm for the sick/SHN voters. But by that point we already wore all our gear, and ELD did not provide us with any extra gear (there was only just enough for 6 of us), so we couldn't take it off otherwise we wouldn't have any left for later. And our supervisor decided that since one SHN person had voted at 7+, the 6 of us should wear the gear and man the whole station from 7-10pm.
How does wearing the gear feel?
There was a N95 mask, face shield, gown and gloves. Wearing the gear was really uncomfortable, especially for 3 hours. I have no idea how nurses and doctors do it all day. Plus ELD didn't cater any spares, so for 3hours i couldn't drink water or pee because we had nothing to change out of.
Breathing through N95 mask made my face all sweaty, and the face shield trapped all the heat around my face. Plus the face shield kept slipping off, it was really loose. I couldn't really sit properly on a chair because the back of the gown was taped up, and if i leaned back the masking tape would stick to the chair. We couldn't use our phones, and my polling station had less than 10 voters during those 3 hours, so we mostly just sat around and chatted and complained about our miserable lives.
How come some polling stations have gloves for voters and some don't?
I believe ELD kept flip flopping on this. Our supervisor was equally frustrated.
We were trained to offer gloves to all voters after sanitising their hands, and to encourage them to wear one even if they didn't want to.
Some time in the late morning, we were told to skip the gloves, so we kept it.
Then a few hours later, we were told to put the gloves on the table, so that people could take them if they wanted, but we did not have to offer it.
Then later we were told that we should offer voters gloves for those who wanted, and they could take one themselves.
And then we were later told that if voters wanted gloves, we should take it for them, so they don't touch the whole stack and contaminate everything.
Why? No idea. I heard at the start they wanted people to wear gloves for safety, then later they said no gloves to speed up the process, then they said to offer gloves cos residents/MPs complained. Not sure how true.
How come the voteq.gowhere.gov.sg site isn't accurate? How come it's not updated?
The site might look nice, but how it works is that one of the people manning the polling station has to MANUALLY update the number every few minutes. Basically, they estimate the number of people in the queue, and go to a webpage and tap on "<10 voters", "10-20 voters", etcetc. It's so strange, it's like... if i printed out an email and started faxing it to people. ELD should have installed sensors to detect people entering or exiting, but i guess human labour was cheaper.
When it got really busy, the guy updating the website had to deal with other questions and was helping out somewhere else doing double duty.
Also, there are one or two times when a busload of old people would come down, and the queue would jump from 5 people to 40 people. When that happens our first instinct is to help the voters find chairs, direct them accordingly, etc, and not to update the website.
Was it difficult?
Dealing with difficult people was the worst. Especially old people who tended to be stubborn.
Common questions:
"My polling station is too far away, why can't I vote here? Same GRC what" - We can only allow you to vote at your designated polling station, I don't know why. No, I can't change the rules just for you. No, the fact that you knew Toh Chin Chye doesn't change anything. I'm sorry you can't walk very far, I still can't do anything. No, Lee Hsien Loong did not personally write you a letter saying you can vote here - that is a mass mailer to everyone saying "please vote for PAP", not "dear Ms Tan, I grant you permission to vote at another polling station", so stop shoving the letter in my face. No, I can't change policy for you, I'm just here to carry out orders. No, shouting about it won't help, except that it gives my supervisor a chance to get the police to come over.
"I didn't bring NRIC or passport, why can't I use my driving license/Passion card/ezlink/etc?" - There are rules governing which forms of ID are allowed, and it has to be one which you have to physically collect. Sorry but there's no point in showing me all your membership cards and credit cards and letters, I can't use any of them. Just because you can use driving license to apply for other things doesn't mean you can use it to vote, I'm sorry. No, I can't change the rules just for you. No, the fact that you knew Toh Chin Chye doesn't change anything. I'm sorry you can't walk very far, I still can't do anything. No, I don't know who you are or how many people you have under you, I don't care and it won't help. No, I can't change policy for you, I'm just here to carry out orders. No, shouting about it won't help, except that it gives my supervisor a chance to get the police to come over.
"Why is my name not on the eligible list?" - If your name was struck off, you probably didn't vote last time, or were overseas. You can apply to reinstate yourself, but not today and not here. No, I can't do it for you. No, I can't get you the person who can do it, they're not around in this polling station. No, i don't know where they are and I don't have the power to summon them to meet you, call ELD yourself, I have other people i need to entertain. No, I don't care that you had such an amazing overseas career, I can't reinstate you myself. No, I don't care that you support the PAP, that has nothing to do with whether you can vote. No, I don't know who you are or how many people you have under you, I don't care and it won't help. No, I can't change policy for you, I'm just here to carry out orders. No, shouting about it won't help, except that it gives my supervisor a chance to get the police to come over.
"Don't touch my NRIC. I don't want your germs" - Trust me, I don't want yours either. If you can put it down for us to verify, and I don't have to touch it, I won't. But if you hold it up and your hands are shaky or you are too far away I can't see your NRIC number. Giving me a 3-minute lecture on COVID and droplets actually means that you're spewing more droplets from your mouth, and you're forcing me to explain this to you and spew more droplets from my mouth, and it lengthens your stay inside the polling station, so ironically if you had quietly let me put two (gloved and sanitised) fingers on your NRIC, it would have been a lower health risk for you.
"How come my relative's voting time was 1-3pm, mine is 4-6pm?" - I have no idea, I'm sorry, this was arranged by ELD. No I'm not trying to discourage you from voting because you support opposition, I don't know you and i'm not pro-PAP myself either. I did not make it my life goal to frustrate you, I'm trying to get through this day myself and I'd rather not be here either. And actually you could have come outside your recommended time and still voted.
That said, I understand why some people were frustrated. It was really hard to help some people too - there was an elderly who was mostly deaf and illiterate and a few of us took forever to communicate to him that he was at the wrong polling station, and he had a bad limp, and I'm not sure if he went to the right place in the end. I guess ELD didn't explain a lot of these things to people properly. And most people probably thought we were ELD staff when we are basically contract workers, so trying to get us to change policies is like trying to convince the Mcdonalds cashier to make the nasi lemak burger a permanent fixture on the menu and not a seasonal item.
Overall, I don't think ELD did a good job. They have 5 years to plan for GE and presidential election, and there are a lot of things they didn't communicate to voters. I'm sure they were caught off guard by COVID, so the gloves thing wasn't entirely their fault (although it's clear they didn't test out the whole process), but a lot of other issues could have been prevented if they did a proper job in between elections.
sauce: https://www.reddit.com/r/singapore/comments/hp3h03/thoughts_from_an_election_official/
First - none of us volunteered, we were simply assigned. You can get out of it only if you're pregnant, or if you are on MC (whether keng or real). We get paid ~$250-300, which sounds great, but the hours are terrible. To earn this money you need to:
do a 1-2h online course
attend a 3h training in person
for a few people, i think there was a separate training session to learn to operate the machine that scans your NRIC
help to set up the polling station the day before (4h for most people, but I was asked to go down for another 2.5h in the morning to do inventory check)
And of course Polling day itself - we were originally told 6am-8.30pm, but some of us had to be there at 4.45am, and of course after the extension we ended up leaving at 10.30pm. I've never worked 17+ hours in a day before.
So even if you ignore the 2h extension, i think the pay works out to about $10/hour. And you deal with some weird **** which i'll talk about later
Are my votes secret? Aren't there PAP people watching you at the polling station?
Yes, from what I can see votes are really secret, there's a serial number on the ballot paper but it's impossible to trace each vote back to a voter without anyone knowing. And yes, each contesting party can send people down to witness the process, PAP always has witnesses there but opposition may not send people down to every site. Even so, there is a specific place they have to sit at, and they cannot see what vote you cast. Nor can they recognise the faces of everyone who went in.
Did you know about the 2h extension? What happened?
We only found out about the 2h extension at 7+. In fact our supervisor was as confused as us, he told us that he saw the news on CNA website but ELD hasn't given any instructions. We had a lot of questions (especially since 7-8pm was supposed to be for higher-risk patients and we had to wear mask/face shield/gown/gloves) but he said she had no idea either.
Our polling station didn't really have a long queue for most of the day, but i guess some others did? Each polling station was supposed to have 20+ people manning it, but only 6 will stay back and don all the biohazard gear to serve people on MC and SHN. By the time we heard about the extension, we were down to 6 people all wearing the gear, and the rest were told to go out of the site to prevent contamination. Then 10min later, our supervisor was told that all 20+ people should man the station from 7-9pm, and only wear the gear from 9-10pm for the sick/SHN voters. But by that point we already wore all our gear, and ELD did not provide us with any extra gear (there was only just enough for 6 of us), so we couldn't take it off otherwise we wouldn't have any left for later. And our supervisor decided that since one SHN person had voted at 7+, the 6 of us should wear the gear and man the whole station from 7-10pm.
How does wearing the gear feel?
There was a N95 mask, face shield, gown and gloves. Wearing the gear was really uncomfortable, especially for 3 hours. I have no idea how nurses and doctors do it all day. Plus ELD didn't cater any spares, so for 3hours i couldn't drink water or pee because we had nothing to change out of.
Breathing through N95 mask made my face all sweaty, and the face shield trapped all the heat around my face. Plus the face shield kept slipping off, it was really loose. I couldn't really sit properly on a chair because the back of the gown was taped up, and if i leaned back the masking tape would stick to the chair. We couldn't use our phones, and my polling station had less than 10 voters during those 3 hours, so we mostly just sat around and chatted and complained about our miserable lives.
How come some polling stations have gloves for voters and some don't?
I believe ELD kept flip flopping on this. Our supervisor was equally frustrated.
We were trained to offer gloves to all voters after sanitising their hands, and to encourage them to wear one even if they didn't want to.
Some time in the late morning, we were told to skip the gloves, so we kept it.
Then a few hours later, we were told to put the gloves on the table, so that people could take them if they wanted, but we did not have to offer it.
Then later we were told that we should offer voters gloves for those who wanted, and they could take one themselves.
And then we were later told that if voters wanted gloves, we should take it for them, so they don't touch the whole stack and contaminate everything.
Why? No idea. I heard at the start they wanted people to wear gloves for safety, then later they said no gloves to speed up the process, then they said to offer gloves cos residents/MPs complained. Not sure how true.
How come the voteq.gowhere.gov.sg site isn't accurate? How come it's not updated?
The site might look nice, but how it works is that one of the people manning the polling station has to MANUALLY update the number every few minutes. Basically, they estimate the number of people in the queue, and go to a webpage and tap on "<10 voters", "10-20 voters", etcetc. It's so strange, it's like... if i printed out an email and started faxing it to people. ELD should have installed sensors to detect people entering or exiting, but i guess human labour was cheaper.
When it got really busy, the guy updating the website had to deal with other questions and was helping out somewhere else doing double duty.
Also, there are one or two times when a busload of old people would come down, and the queue would jump from 5 people to 40 people. When that happens our first instinct is to help the voters find chairs, direct them accordingly, etc, and not to update the website.
Was it difficult?
Dealing with difficult people was the worst. Especially old people who tended to be stubborn.
Common questions:
"My polling station is too far away, why can't I vote here? Same GRC what" - We can only allow you to vote at your designated polling station, I don't know why. No, I can't change the rules just for you. No, the fact that you knew Toh Chin Chye doesn't change anything. I'm sorry you can't walk very far, I still can't do anything. No, Lee Hsien Loong did not personally write you a letter saying you can vote here - that is a mass mailer to everyone saying "please vote for PAP", not "dear Ms Tan, I grant you permission to vote at another polling station", so stop shoving the letter in my face. No, I can't change policy for you, I'm just here to carry out orders. No, shouting about it won't help, except that it gives my supervisor a chance to get the police to come over.
"I didn't bring NRIC or passport, why can't I use my driving license/Passion card/ezlink/etc?" - There are rules governing which forms of ID are allowed, and it has to be one which you have to physically collect. Sorry but there's no point in showing me all your membership cards and credit cards and letters, I can't use any of them. Just because you can use driving license to apply for other things doesn't mean you can use it to vote, I'm sorry. No, I can't change the rules just for you. No, the fact that you knew Toh Chin Chye doesn't change anything. I'm sorry you can't walk very far, I still can't do anything. No, I don't know who you are or how many people you have under you, I don't care and it won't help. No, I can't change policy for you, I'm just here to carry out orders. No, shouting about it won't help, except that it gives my supervisor a chance to get the police to come over.
"Why is my name not on the eligible list?" - If your name was struck off, you probably didn't vote last time, or were overseas. You can apply to reinstate yourself, but not today and not here. No, I can't do it for you. No, I can't get you the person who can do it, they're not around in this polling station. No, i don't know where they are and I don't have the power to summon them to meet you, call ELD yourself, I have other people i need to entertain. No, I don't care that you had such an amazing overseas career, I can't reinstate you myself. No, I don't care that you support the PAP, that has nothing to do with whether you can vote. No, I don't know who you are or how many people you have under you, I don't care and it won't help. No, I can't change policy for you, I'm just here to carry out orders. No, shouting about it won't help, except that it gives my supervisor a chance to get the police to come over.
"Don't touch my NRIC. I don't want your germs" - Trust me, I don't want yours either. If you can put it down for us to verify, and I don't have to touch it, I won't. But if you hold it up and your hands are shaky or you are too far away I can't see your NRIC number. Giving me a 3-minute lecture on COVID and droplets actually means that you're spewing more droplets from your mouth, and you're forcing me to explain this to you and spew more droplets from my mouth, and it lengthens your stay inside the polling station, so ironically if you had quietly let me put two (gloved and sanitised) fingers on your NRIC, it would have been a lower health risk for you.
"How come my relative's voting time was 1-3pm, mine is 4-6pm?" - I have no idea, I'm sorry, this was arranged by ELD. No I'm not trying to discourage you from voting because you support opposition, I don't know you and i'm not pro-PAP myself either. I did not make it my life goal to frustrate you, I'm trying to get through this day myself and I'd rather not be here either. And actually you could have come outside your recommended time and still voted.
That said, I understand why some people were frustrated. It was really hard to help some people too - there was an elderly who was mostly deaf and illiterate and a few of us took forever to communicate to him that he was at the wrong polling station, and he had a bad limp, and I'm not sure if he went to the right place in the end. I guess ELD didn't explain a lot of these things to people properly. And most people probably thought we were ELD staff when we are basically contract workers, so trying to get us to change policies is like trying to convince the Mcdonalds cashier to make the nasi lemak burger a permanent fixture on the menu and not a seasonal item.
Overall, I don't think ELD did a good job. They have 5 years to plan for GE and presidential election, and there are a lot of things they didn't communicate to voters. I'm sure they were caught off guard by COVID, so the gloves thing wasn't entirely their fault (although it's clear they didn't test out the whole process), but a lot of other issues could have been prevented if they did a proper job in between elections.
sauce: https://www.reddit.com/r/singapore/comments/hp3h03/thoughts_from_an_election_official/
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