For the first time, the representatives at PAM’s congress in the summer will be elected in an online-only election – postal votes are a thing of the past. PAM’s election working group has been building the system since last summer together with the service provider Edita Prima.

“The most important part is always the groundwork, which is done together with the election working group. We’ve been thinking about what features the service should have, what details to ask of the candidates and how the information will eventually be presented on the site. We are also designing the visual appearance of the site. We had to have a pretty good idea of what the end result would look like in March back in August”, says account manager Ville Hiltunen from Edita Prima.

The election candidates register using the same online system where voting will take place in March-April. At the turn of the year there were almost 1000 candidates, and it is still possible to stand at the branches’ candidate nomination meetings. There will also be a candidate gallery in the same place where voters can search for and compare candidates.

Edita Prima has been organising online elections since 2012, recently also for some trade unions, PAM being the biggest. The service has been built up over many years, and has now been refined for PAM’s needs. The visual appearance has also been updated, Hiltunen says.

“The voting itself is extremely simple. You log in, which ensures nobody can vote more than once, and then you either enter the voting number directly or there are a number of ways to search for the candidate you want. It just takes a few clicks. I recommend using the candidate gallery, because it makes it easy to search for candidates you like and you can get to know them better”, Hiltunen advises.

Further information on the elections and the congress in the congress section on the PAM website. The voting period is 25 March–8 April.