How to Vote by Mail in Hillsborough County, FL

To vote by mail in Hillsborough County, FL, request a ballot from the Supervisor of Elections by 5 p.m. on the 12th day before the election, mark it, sign the Voter’s Certificate on the return envelope, and get it back to the elections office by 7 p.m. on Election Day.¹ Any registered voter in the county can do this. No excuse or qualifying reason is required, but you must be registered at least 29 days before Election Day to be eligible to vote at all.²

Requesting Your Ballot

You can submit a request through the Supervisor of Elections website, by phone at 813-612-4180, by email, by mail, or in person at any branch office.¹ The request has to reach the office by 5 p.m. on the 12th day before the election.³

Have this information ready: your name, home address, date of birth, and one of the following identifiers — your Florida driver license number, your Florida ID number, or the last four digits of your Social Security number. Whichever you give must match what the elections office already has on file. A written request sent by mail must also carry your signature.¹

Having Someone Else Request For You

If you cannot make the request yourself, Florida law allows an immediate family member or your legal guardian to do it at your direct instruction. Immediate family here means your spouse, parent, child, grandparent, grandchild, or sibling, and the same relatives of your spouse. A voter with a disability may also designate someone outside the family. The person making the request must give their own name, address, relationship to you, and an ID number if available.³

How Long a Request Stays Active

One request covers every election through the end of the calendar year of the next regularly scheduled general election.³ A request submitted in 2025, for example, stays active through the end of 2026 because the next general election falls in November 2026. Florida shortened this window from two general election cycles to one in 2021, so if you had a standing request from years ago and never renewed, it has already expired. Submit a new one.

Marking the Ballot and Signing the Envelope

Your packet contains the ballot itself, a secrecy sleeve, and a return envelope with a Voter’s Certificate printed on the back.⁴ Use black or blue pen and fill in the ovals next to your choices completely. Stray marks or partial fills can cause the optical scanners to reject the ballot during counting.

Slide the marked ballot into the secrecy sleeve, then place the sleeve inside the return envelope and seal it.

Sign the Voter’s Certificate on the outside of the return envelope. This is the step that most often trips voters up. The Supervisor of Elections compares this signature against the one in your voter registration record.⁵ Forget the signature, or sign in a way that looks too different from what is on file, and the ballot will be flagged and will not count unless you fix it.

Getting the Ballot Back On Time

The completed ballot must physically reach the Supervisor of Elections by 7 p.m. on Election Day. A postmark does not count. Arrive at 7:01 p.m. and the ballot is rejected.¹

The U.S. Postal Service recommends mailing your completed ballot at least one week before the deadline and notes that some jurisdictions suggest more lead time than that.⁶ Two weeks is safer. Once it is in the mailbox, transit time is out of your hands.

If you want to avoid mail entirely, Hillsborough County operates Secure Ballot Intake Stations at each early voting location during early voting hours and at Supervisor of Elections offices during regular business hours.¹ Florida law requires an elections employee to monitor every station in person at all times.⁷ Drop your signed and sealed envelope into the slot and you are done. Specific addresses and hours are posted on the Hillsborough County Supervisor of Elections website before each election.

If you need someone else to drop the ballot off, Florida caps how many ballots one person can return. A designee may only pick up or return ballots for two voters per election, not counting their own and those of immediate family members.⁸

Tracking Your Ballot

Hillsborough County uses BallotTrax to send automatic notifications by text, email, or phone when your ballot is mailed out, when it arrives at the elections office, and when it has been counted.⁹ Sign up through the Supervisor of Elections website before your ballot ships. Florida law also requires each Supervisor of Elections to notify voters about a free status-lookup system maintained by the state, so you can check progress even without signing up for alerts.³

Fixing a Signature Problem

If your signature is missing or does not match, the Supervisor of Elections must attempt to contact you by email, text, or phone, followed by a first-class mail notice.⁵ Do not wait for that letter. If tracking shows a problem, start the cure process immediately.

To cure, complete and sign a Vote-by-Mail Cure Affidavit and submit it with a copy of your photo ID. You can return the affidavit by email, fax, mail, or hand delivery. It must reach the elections office by 5 p.m. on the second day after the election.¹⁰ Miss that deadline and the ballot will not be counted. The affidavit is available on the Hillsborough County Supervisor of Elections website. Even if the signature on the affidavit itself still does not match your registration record, the canvassing board can count your ballot as long as you submit a current and valid photo ID that confirms your identity.⁵

Changing Your Mind and Voting in Person

Requesting a mail ballot does not lock you in. If you still have the ballot and have not returned it, bring it to your polling place or an early voting site, hand it to the workers to be canceled, and vote in person.⁷

If you show up without the ballot, what happens depends on what the elections office can confirm. If they have already received your mail ballot, you cannot vote again; the mail ballot stands. If they can confirm they have not received it, you vote in person and any mail ballot arriving later is rejected. If they cannot tell either way, you cast a provisional ballot and the canvassing board sorts it out afterward. Once a completed mail ballot reaches the elections office, it counts as your vote and cannot be undone.⁷

Military and Overseas Voters

Active-duty service members, their spouses and dependents, and U.S. citizens living abroad follow a different process under the Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act. Hillsborough County must send ballots to these voters at least 45 days before each federal election, and voters can choose to receive their blank ballot by mail, email, or fax.¹¹

Overseas voters returning a ballot by mail get extra time. The ballot must be postmarked by Election Day and received within 10 days after the election. This 10-day extension applies only to presidential preference primaries, general elections, and special elections.¹¹ Overseas voters also have the option to fax the completed ballot and signed Voter’s Certificate directly to the Supervisor of Elections.

If Election Day is approaching and your ballot has not arrived, contact the Hillsborough County Supervisor of Elections right away. You can use the Federal Write-In Absentee Ballot as a backup. If your regular ballot arrives after you have already submitted the write-in version, fill out and return the regular ballot and note that you previously submitted a write-in. The elections office will count only one.¹²

1
Hillsborough County Elections, FL. Vote By Mail
2
Vote.gov. How to Register in Florida
3
Florida Legislature. Florida Code 101.62 – Request for Vote-by-Mail Ballots
4
Florida Legislature. Florida Code 101.64 – Delivery of Vote-by-Mail Ballots; Envelopes; Form
5
Florida Legislature. Florida Code 101.68 – Canvassing of Vote-by-Mail Ballot
6
United States Postal Service. Election Mail
7
Florida Legislature. Florida Code 101.69 – Voting in Person; Return of Vote-by-Mail Ballot
8
Florida Department of State. Vote-by-Mail
9
Hillsborough County Elections, FL. Track Your Ballot
10
Hillsborough County Elections, FL. Cure a Signature Issue
11
Florida Department of State. Military and Overseas Citizens Voting
12
Federal Voting Assistance Program. Federal Write-In Absentee Ballot