Research reveals scale of council electoral roll pre-ticking

by Daniel Farey-Jones, Brand Republic 25-Feb-05, 07:00

LONDON – A survey of local councils carried out by Equifax indicates that most plan to pre-tick the electoral roll forms that they send out this year.

Equifax spoke to 397 out of the UK's 463 local councils about their plans for the 2006 electoral roll forms. The proportion of these, which said that they plan to pre-tick individuals who opted out this year, was 62%.

The survey highlighted the fact that generally councils who pre-tick do it because they claim it makes printing and processing easier; many said they give electors adequate information on how to change their decision.

Equifax also got responses from 379 councils as to whether they had pre-filled their forms in 2004. Most of these, 281, had pre-ticked just the individuals who opted out in the previous year, and another three pre-ticked everyone. The average opt-out rate of these 284 councils was 32%.

The councils who did not pre-tick their forms in 2004 numbered 95, with these councils recording a lower average opt out rate of 24%.

The overall national opt-out rate is 29%.

According to the DMA's recent consumer survey, 57% of consumers are happy to give personal information to companies of which they are a customer, whereas 66% are happy to receive direct marketing if it is relevant to them.

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